tracking changes to system config files?

[Gary Funck]

We manage a few internal servers: a mix of x86/x86_64 Fedora,
CentOS, Sun Solaris, SGI Irix, and SGI Altix/SuSE.  To track
local config changes, we create RCS directories in the root
hierachy (mainly under /etc) and check our changes in/out
using RCS.  It's never been a great solution, but at least
we know what we've changed, along with the revision history.

I've toyed with the idea of keeping a separte CVS hierarchy,
for each host, and then rsync'ing the result over into the
host's file system whenever changes are made, but this doesn't
seem like a great solution either.  It is better than having
RCS files sprinkled throughout the file system, however.

Do you have an opinion on the proposed CVS method, or suggestions
on better methods for tracking changes to system config files?

thanks,
  - Gary