I ran into this problem multiple times now.
You have to log into a server you don't know and have to find where an application is installed and where its config files are.
I know that most application configs are in /etc/
... e.g. /etc/nagios/nrpe.cfg
But knowing is not reliable. How can I find them guaranteed?
And what is a good way to inspect and study the configs? Most applications allow for other files to be included so the configuration can be split into multiple files which takes ages to write down all the files' locations and look at all of them individually which gets even worse if the structure is cascading.
FILES
section, which usually includes the list of paths/descriptions of the relevant configuration files. Are you specifically thinking about poorly documented applications?