[Serdev] Re: [Serusers] Configuration examples

[Nils Ohlmeier]

Hi Greger,

thanks for your detailed answer.
I have absolutely no problem with using the new m4 buildsystem. But correct me 
if I'm wrong, but AFAIK it is not yet ready to be used, or?
And Jiri keeps pushing me that these configuration examples are important for 
the Ottendorf release :-)

So I would propose that I'll keep on putting new config examples into the etc 
directory on the CVS until the new buildsystem is ready to be used. And then 
I will transfer my configurations to that system.

Greetings
  Nils

On Monday 14 May 2007 13:04:23 Greger V. Teigre wrote:
> Hi Nils,
> Good initiative!
> I think we need to coordinate our efforts so we avoid duplicate work.
> ONsip.org and iptel.org merged partly because we wanted to align the SER
> - Getting Started configuration files with the development of SER. As
> you probably have seen on the lists, the intention is to add the
> document and the config files to the cvs (SER 2.0).
> Most beginners of SER (and many OpenSER beginners) start out with the
> SER - Getting Started document and configs. From what I have seen, there
> are now many, many production configs out there using the basic
> structure from the getting started files.
>
> We have learned quite a lot about maintaining example configuration files:
> 1. People need small pieces in order to understand how each feature is
> implemented
> 2. Without an expert pre-integrating configs/features, many/most? people
> struggle to integrate a feature into another config
> 3. Maintaining many config files quickly becomes an impossible task
>
> We started out with a focus on the "getting started" and thus created a
> document with commented config files.  We made the config files
> available standalone (ready to be run) and subsequently focused more and
> more on maintaining the configuration files and add more features and
> then let the comments/document come afterwards.  Keeping everything in
> sync was a problem.  We had early decided to keep everything in one
> common structure and let each config build on each other (to
> incrementally add functionality). This helped us in making sure
> everything worked and people didn't have to integrate small examples
> into one big themselves.
>
> Our biggest problem was to keep adding features and making sure that we
> updated configs to new SER versions.
>
> Based on these experiences, we have done the following:
> - Migrated the document to docbook
> - Created the m4 build system (http://www.iptel.org/ser/doc/buildsystem)
> which keeps the configuration files WITH comments and allows
> auto-generation of the commented config ready for inclusion in SER -
> Getting Started document
>
> In creating the build system, I put emphasize on the capability to
> maintain different configuration sets (called feature packages, ex.
> gettingstarted) composed of different feature sets (helloworld, auth,
> natrtpproxy etc),  each consisting of a set of features (natdetection,
> natmangling, etc). The configuration files are easier to maintain and as
> added value, people can automatically generate their config file based
> on an example with correct IP address, port etc. (BTW, I work on
> allowing people to generate their config files directly from from
> iptel.org)
>
> This may sound complicated, but I believe a quick look at the doc
> (http://www.iptel.org/ser/doc/buildsystem) will quickly give you the idea.
>
> Currently, the helloworld version of SER - Getting Started has been
> migrated to SER 2.0 and Alfred Heggestad and Ladislav have merged the
> current ser.cfg config with the optimized NAT example, and we will try
> to use that config as a starting point for a new NAT SER - Getting
> Started configuration file.
>
> I don't think everything should go into the SER - Getting Started
> feature package (though we should at least avoid creating two versions
> of exactly the same functionality), but I hope you will spend some
> minutes to see how a new feature package in the build system can help
> your goals. I will of course be happy to assist you (as I have waited to
> see interest before documenting creating new feature packages).
> g-)
>
> Nils Ohlmeier wrote:
> > Hello everybody,
> >
> > as we want to provide more examples for the configuration the following
> > the question came up:
> >
> > Do you prefer
> > - one big example configuration
> >   - probably harder to understand
> >   - easier to maintain for us
> > - one example config file per "feature"
> >   - probably easier to understand your desired "feature"
> >   - you might have problems to integrate all your desired "features" into
> > one config without breaking anything
> >   - harder to maintain for us, as we have to update several files :-)
> >
> > As the configuration examples are indented to be for the community, I
> > would like to know what you prefer or if you see other options.
> >
> > Thanks
> >   Nils
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