Re: [exim] Disk failure => 5xx error code

> I really don't like this idea because it is so much of a kludge. I
> suppose, though, thinking more about it, that since the effect will be
> to change a 5xx error into a 4xx error, it might be a tolerable kludge.
> A possible problem is that not all Unix-like OS have the same set of
> error values, though that can be coped with by the use of #ifdefs, I
> suppose.

All three points are entirely correct.

The question is, can we handle a partial machine failure in a way that
is on balance better than what happens at the moment, given that 99.99%
of the time the machine isn't broken. Hence my suggestion of a
conservative test and a cautious response. It's a case of working out
the circumstances in which exim can return a hard error, asking "can we
be pretty sure this is a machine problem?" and if so converting it to a
soft error and logging the incident (to detect false positives).

Crisis management is never going to be pretty, the only alternative is
not to have any at all.

John