[Solved] Unable to configure .fetchmailrc

Although this is the first message, I'm marking it [Solved] since I found the 
answer while writing the message.

Problem : I'm having difficulty configuring .fetchmailrc which doesn't seem to 
behave as described in the man page.

Answer : This is because Debian doesn't use the configuration file given in the 
man page - it doesn't use the configuration file /root/.fetchmailrc .  To 
understand, you need to look at file /etc/init.d/fetchmail where you will find 
the lines

   CONFFILE="/etc/fetchmailrc"

   OPTIONS="$OPTIONS -f $CONFFILE --pidfile $PIDFILE"

The effect of the -f option is to replace /root/.fetchmailrc with 
/etc/fetchmailrc .

Debian 13 does not use and does not need .fetchmailrc as given in the man page.
Use /etc/fetchmailrc instead.

The man page says that if you modify /root/.fetchmailrc , the daemon will 
automatically restart.  This appears to be true for the replacement 
/etc/fetchmailrc also.

   root@titan ~ journalctl -S 2026-08-1508:28:15 | grep -e 'fetchmail.*start'
   Aug 15 08:48:26 titan fetchmail[295717]: restarting fetchmail (/etc/fetchmailrc changed)
   Aug 15 08:48:26 titan fetchmail[295717]: starting fetchmail 6.4.39 daemon

Roger