> >> > OpenBSD packages put configs in /etc not /usr/pkg/PACKAGENAME/etc.
> >> Is that good or bad?
> > It depends.  Its a design choice.  If you're wanting to back up all your
> > configs before you do an upgrade its good because they're all together.
> > If you're wanting to remove a package manually (why?  pkg_?? should do
> > it), you have to remember to pull out of /etc...
> 
> None those two things seems to be bad. It probably doesn't make any
> difference once the app is up and running. So from that point of view it's
> neutral. :-) But at least it's consistant. FreeBSD put that configs for
> apps under /usr/local/etc. Some apps (like Postfix) have their own
> directory, some don't. Being consistant may be good in itself, but it may
> also be useless. A single configuration file in it's own directory doesn't
> really help anyone.
> 
> There is one directoy that I have been shouting for for years now: ~/.etc
> or something like that. Putting all configuration files in ~ makes a home
> directory look pretty messy after a while. I know I could set that up
> myself (and in many cases I did) but I'm still looking for other people
> who think that's a good idea too.
> 
> > I think its a good thing to have everything under /etc.
> 
> Why?
> 
> FreeBSD has only the system-stuff in there. Configs of all apps don't have
> to be on the same partition as /. They won't run without /usr anyway. And
> /etc could become pretty big with time. :-)

FWIW:

Pkgsrc supports custom configuration locations.

The pkgsrc user can define PKG_SYSCONFBASE to /etc or /etc/pkg or 
/home/user/.etc for example.

Also it can be changed per-package too.

See the pkgsrc guide about "How do I change the location of configuration 
files?" and "How PKG_SYSCONFDIR is set".