[Serusers] Help on managing ser.cfg

[Greg Fausak]

I may have posted this
before, if so, I apologize for the duplication.

Our ser.cfg files became unmanageable almost
immediately.  It was apparent that something had
to be done to get a grasp on things.  We have dozens of
configuration files that must all work together, ports,
gateways, etc.  We did not want to duplicate
code fragments.

We used the standard C preprocessor. #include, #define, etc.
Although not perfect, it goes a long way.
For example, here is a proxy definition of ours.

------------begin-----------------
#include "sercommon.pre"
/* customize for this server */
#define DOMAIN          voicething.com
#define LISTENIP        198.212.169.20
#define NATIP           198.212.169.253
#define VMHOSTPORT      vm.voicething.com:5060
#define DBURL   "sql://USER@HOST:PORT/DATABASE"

/* this is the top section, common to all ser servers */
#include "sertop.pre"

/* this is the custom proxy server */
/* #include "sergatewaysimple.pre" */
#include "sergatewayob.pre"
-----------------end-------------------------

I've got an include directory in /usr/local/lib/ser/include:
sergatewayice.pre      sermodenuminit.pre
README              sergatewaynorm.pre     sermodgroupinit.pre
ser800.pre          sergatewayob.pre       sermodtminit.pre
sercommon.pre          sermoduriinit.pre
sercontus.pre            sermodusrlocinit.pre
serdef.pre          serinclude.pre         serproxy.pre
serdef.pre.old      serintl.pre            serregister.pre
serenum.pre         serlocal.pre           sertop.pre
sererror.pre        sermodaccinit.pre
sergatewaybyip.pre  sermodauth_dbinit.pre

Then I have a Makefile, simply:

IDIR=/usr/local/lib/ser/include
CPDEF=-I$(IDIR)
CPP=cpp
CPFLAGS=-w -x c -E -undef
CPCMD=$(CPP) $(CPFLAGS) $(CPDEF)
SERFILE=ser.cfg

.SUFFIXES: .cfg .pre

.pre.cfg:
         -rm -f ser.cfg
         -mv $(SERFILE)=1 $ $(SERFILE)=2
         -mv $(SERFILE)=0 $ $(SERFILE)=1
         -mv $*.cfg $ $(SERFILE)=0
         $(CPCMD) -o - $< | sed 's/\\"//g' > $*.cfg
         ln -s $*.cfg $(SERFILE)

The resulting ser.cfg file is HUGE, but very consistent.
I can add a gateway, open another port, change DB permissions, whatever,
and those changes are usually isolated to an include file.  Testing is
easier too.  I can include a different gateway file (for instance) and
test a ser.cfg production before deploying.

Strings are hard (but not impossible) to work with using the  
C-preprocessor.

---greg


On Aug 17, 2004, at 6:47 AM, Steve Blair wrote:

>
> Alan:
>
>   I need this functionality too. I was looking at cobbling together  
> something
> using exec but if you find a better way I'd like to hear about it.
>
> Thanks,Steve
>
> Alan Litster wrote:
>
>> Hi List,
>>
>> My ser.cfg file has grown quite large now and it's becoming quite  
>> hard to
>> manage all the gateways. For example, if we need to change them.
>>
>> What I'd like to have is a file that contains the hosts, e.g.
>> @GW1@	gateway1.mydomin.com
>> @GW2@	gateway2.mydomin.com
>>
>> then have a ser.cfg.template script where I'd define the hosts in the
>> forward/reply commands as @GW1@ etc.. and run a shell script/command  
>> on that
>> file to generate the master ser.cfg file.
>>
>> My question is that is there already a program available that would  
>> allow me
>> to do this kind of thing?
>>
>> Regards,
>>
>> Alan
>>
>>
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Greg Fausak
www.AddaBrand.com
(US) 469-546-1265