Jan,

great to hear that you have implemented the config search
in the right way!

Just a word of caution if somebody would elaborate "multiple configs"
scenario as you wrote:

> The only thing I wasn't sure of was whether to read all found
> configuration files, or whether to stop on the first successful load.

> By continuing the search it would be possible to have a global shared
> config file (shared using NFS or rdist/cfengine copying), but have
> machine/system-specific tweaks in a small local file.

Be careful before opening a can of worms that comes with config
inheritance. It is not intuitive (you noticed that) and its semantics may
have to differ even for different configuration variables (not to mention
different programs using that model). The result is often confusing for a
system administrator.

cfengine btw is a great concept making it possible to generate a config
file per configuration, eliminating the need for run-time path-based
inheritance. Each setup can have its own carefully crafted by cfengine or
other means configfile - it makes the life much easier.

Yours,
--
Ivan