-$Cambridge: exim/doc/doc-txt/NewStuff,v 1.9 2004/11/11 11:40:36 ph10 Exp $
+$Cambridge: exim/doc/doc-txt/NewStuff,v 1.75 2005/09/22 12:58:14 fanf2 Exp $
New Features in Exim
--------------------
updated when there is a relatively large batch of changes). The doc/ChangeLog
file contains a listing of all changes, including bug fixes.
+Exim version 4.53
+-----------------
+
+TK/01 Added the "success_on_redirect" address verification option. When an
+ address generates new addresses during routing, Exim will abort
+ verification with "success" when more than one address has been
+ generated, but continue to verify a single new address. The latter
+ does not happen when the new "success_on_redirect" option is set, like
+
+ require verify = recipient/success_on_redirect/callout=10s
+
+ In that case, verification will succeed when a router generates a new
+ address.
+
+PH/01 Support for SQLite database lookups has been added. This is another
+ query-style lookup, but it is slightly different from the others because
+ a file name is required in addition to the SQL query. This is because an
+ SQLite database is a single file and there is no daemon as in other SQL
+ databases. The interface to Exim requires the name of the file, as an
+ absolute path, to be given at the start of the query. It is separated
+ from the query by white space. This means that the path name cannot
+ contain white space. Here is a lookup expansion example:
+
+ ${lookup sqlite {/some/thing/sqlitedb \
+ select name from aliases where id='ph10';}}
-Version 4.44
-------------
-
- 1. There is a new build-time option called CONFIGURE_GROUP which works like
- CONFIGURE_OWNER. It specifies one additional group that is permitted for
- the runtime configuration file when the group write permission is set.
+ In a list, the syntax is similar. For example:
- 2. The "control=submission" facility has a new option /retain_sender. This
- has the effect of setting local_sender_retain true and local_from_check
- false for the incoming message in which it is encountered.
+ domainlist relay_domains = sqlite;/some/thing/sqlitedb \
+ select * from relays where ip='$sender_host_address';
+
+ The only character affected by the ${quote_sqlite: operator is a single
+ quote, which it doubles.
- 3. $recipients is now available in the predata ACL (oversight).
+ The SQLite library handles multiple simultaneous accesses to the database
+ internally. Multiple readers are permitted, but only one process can
+ update at once. Attempts to access the database while it is being updated
+ are rejected after a timeout period, during which the SQLite library
+ waits for the lock to be released. In Exim, the default timeout is set
+ to 5 seconds, but it can be changed by means of the sqlite_lock_timeout
+ option.
+
+ Note that you must set LOOKUP_SQLITE=yes in Local/Makefile in order to
+ obtain SQLite support, and you will also need to add -lsqlite3 to the
+ EXTRALIBS setting. And of course, you have to install SQLite on your
+ host first.
+
+PH/02 The variable $message_id is now deprecated, to be replaced by
+ $message_exim_id, which makes it clearer which ID is being referenced.
+
+PH/03 The use of forbid_filter_existstest now also locks out the use of the
+ ${stat: expansion item.
+
+PH/04 The IGNOREQUOTA extension to the LMTP protocol is now available in both
+ the lmtp transport and the smtp transport running in LMTP mode. In the
+ lmtp transport there is a new Boolean option called ignore_quota, and in
+ the smtp transport there is a new Boolean option called
+ lmtp_ignore_quota. If either of these options is set TRUE, the string
+ "IGNOREQUOTA" is added to RCPT commands when using the LMTP protocol,
+ provided that the server has advertised support for IGNOREQUOTA in its
+ response to the LHLO command.
+
+PH/05 Previously, if "verify = helo" was set in an ACL, the condition was true
+ only if the host matched helo_try_verify_hosts, which caused the
+ verification to occur when the EHLO/HELO command was issued. The ACL just
+ tested the remembered result. Now, if a previous verification attempt has
+ not happened, "verify = helo" does it there and then.
+
+PH/06 It is now possible to specify a port number along with a host name or
+ IP address in the list of hosts defined in the manualroute or
+ queryprogram routers, fallback_hosts, or the "hosts" option of the smtp
+ transport. These all override any port specification on the transport.
+ The relatively standard syntax of using a colon separator has been
+ adopted, but there are some gotchas that need attention:
+
+ * In all these lists of hosts, colon is the default separator, so either
+ the colon that specifies a port must be doubled, or the separator must
+ be changed. The following two examples have the same effect:
+
+ fallback_hosts = host1.tld::1225 : host2.tld::1226
+ fallback_hosts = <; host1.tld:1225 ; host2.tld:1226
+
+ * When IPv6 addresses are involved, it gets worse, because they contain
+ colons of their own. To make this case easier, it is permitted to
+ enclose an IP address (either v4 or v6) in square brackets if a port
+ number follows. Here's an example from a manualroute router:
+
+ route_list = * "</ [10.1.1.1]:1225 / [::1]:1226"
+
+ If the "/MX" feature is to be used as well as a port specifier, the port
+ must come last. For example:
+
+ route_list = * dom1.tld/mx::1225
+
+PH/07 $smtp_command_argument is now set for all SMTP commands, not just the
+ non-message ones. This makes it possible to inspect the complete command
+ for RCPT commands, for example. But see also PH/45 below.
+
+PH/08 The ${eval expansion now supports % as a "remainder" operator.
+
+PH/09 There is a new ACL condition "verify = not_blind". It checks that there
+ are no blind (bcc) recipients in the message. Every envelope recipient
+ must appear either in a To: header line or in a Cc: header line for this
+ condition to be true. Local parts are checked case-sensitively; domains
+ are checked case-insensitively. If Resent-To: or Resent-Cc: header lines
+ exist, they are also checked. This condition can be used only in a DATA
+ or non-SMTP ACL.
+
+ There are, of course, many legitimate messages that make use of blind
+ (bcc) recipients. This check should not be used on its own for blocking
+ messages.
+
+PH/10 There is a new ACL control called "suppress_local_fixups". This applies
+ to locally submitted (non TCP/IP) messages, and is the complement of
+ "control = submission". It disables the fixups that are normally applied
+ to locally-submitted messages. Specifically:
+
+ (a) Any Sender: header line is left alone (in this respect, it's a
+ dynamic version of local_sender_retain).
+
+ (b) No Message-ID:, From:, or Date: headers are added.
+
+ (c) There is no check that From: corresponds to the actual sender.
+
+ This feature may be useful when a remotely-originated message is
+ accepted, passed to some scanning program, and then re-submitted for
+ delivery. It means that all four possibilities can now be specified:
+
+ (1) Locally submitted, fixups applies: the default.
+ (2) Locally submitted, no fixups applied: use control =
+ suppress_local_fixups.
+ (3) Remotely submitted, no fixups applied: the default.
+ (4) Remotely submitted, fixups applied: use control = submission.
+
+PH/11 There is a new log selector, "unknown_in_list", which provokes a log
+ entry when the result of a list match is failure because a DNS lookup
+ failed.
+
+PH/12 There is a new variable called $smtp_command which contains the full SMTP
+ command (compare $smtp_command_argument - see PH/07 above). This makes it
+ possible to distinguish between HELO and EHLO, and also between things
+ like "MAIL FROM:<>" and "MAIL FROM: <>".
+
+TF/01 There's a new script in util/ratelimit.pl which extracts sending
+ rates from log files, to assist with choosing appropriate settings
+ when deploying the ratelimit ACL condition.
+
+PH/13 A new letter, "H", is available in retry parameter sets. It is similar
+ to "G" (geometric increasing time intervals), except that the interval
+ before the next retry is randomized. Each time, the previous interval is
+ multiplied by the factor in order to get a maximum for the next interval.
+ The mininum interval is the first argument of the parameter, and an
+ actual interval is chosen randomly between them. Such a rule has been
+ found to be helpful in cluster configurations when all the members of the
+ cluster restart at once, and may synchronize their queue processing
+ times.
+
+PH/14 The options never_users, trusted_users, admin_groups, and trusted_groups
+ are now expanded when the configuration file is read.
+
+
+Exim version 4.52
+-----------------
+
+TF/01 Support for checking Client SMTP Authorization has been added. CSA is a
+ system which allows a site to advertise which machines are and are not
+ permitted to send email. This is done by placing special SRV records in
+ the DNS, which are looked up using the client's HELO domain. At this
+ time CSA is still an Internet-Draft.
+
+ Client SMTP Authorization checks are performed by the ACL condition
+ verify=csa. This will fail if the client is not authorized. If there is
+ a DNS problem, or if no valid CSA SRV record is found, or if the client
+ is authorized, the condition succeeds. These three cases can be
+ distinguished using the expansion variable $csa_status, which can take
+ one of the values "fail", "defer", "unknown", or "ok". The condition
+ does not itself defer because that would be likely to cause problems
+ for legitimate email.
+
+ The error messages produced by the CSA code include slightly more
+ detail. If $csa_status is "defer" this may be because of problems
+ looking up the CSA SRV record, or problems looking up the CSA target
+ address record. There are four reasons for $csa_status being "fail":
+ the client's host name is explicitly not authorized; the client's IP
+ address does not match any of the CSA target IP addresses; the client's
+ host name is authorized but it has no valid target IP addresses (e.g.
+ the target's addresses are IPv6 and the client is using IPv4); or the
+ client's host name has no CSA SRV record but a parent domain has
+ asserted that all subdomains must be explicitly authorized.
+
+ The verify=csa condition can take an argument which is the domain to
+ use for the DNS query. The default is verify=csa/$sender_helo_name.
+
+ This implementation includes an extension to CSA. If the query domain
+ is an address literal such as [192.0.2.95], or if it is a bare IP
+ address, Exim will search for CSA SRV records in the reverse DNS as if
+ the HELO domain was e.g. 95.2.0.192.in-addr.arpa. Therefore it is
+ meaningful to say, for example, verify=csa/$sender_host_address - in
+ fact, this is the check that Exim performs if the client does not say
+ HELO. This extension can be turned off by setting the main
+ configuration option dns_csa_use_reverse = false.
+
+ If a CSA SRV record is not found for the domain itself, then a search
+ is performed through its parent domains for a record which might be
+ making assertions about subdomains. The maximum depth of this search is
+ limited using the main configuration option dns_csa_search_limit, which
+ takes the value 5 by default. Exim does not look for CSA SRV records in
+ a top level domain, so the default settings handle HELO domains as long
+ as seven (hostname.five.four.three.two.one.com) which encompasses the
+ vast majority of legitimate HELO domains.
+
+ The dnsdb lookup also has support for CSA. Although dnsdb already
+ supports SRV lookups, this is not sufficient because of the extra
+ parent domain search behaviour of CSA, and (as with PTR lookups)
+ dnsdb also turns IP addresses into lookups in the reverse DNS space.
+ The result of ${lookup dnsdb {csa=$sender_helo_name} } has two
+ space-separated fields: an authorization code and a target host name.
+ The authorization code can be "Y" for yes, "N" for no, "X" for explicit
+ authorization required but absent, or "?" for unknown.
+
+PH/01 The amount of output produced by the "make" process has been reduced,
+ because the compile lines are often rather long, making it all pretty
+ unreadable. The new style is along the lines of the 2.6 Linux kernel:
+ just a short line for each module that is being compiled or linked.
+ However, it is still possible to get the full output, by calling "make"
+ like this:
+
+ FULLECHO='' make -e
+
+ The value of FULLECHO defaults to "@", the flag character that suppresses
+ command reflection in "make". When you ask for the full output, it is
+ given in addition to the the short output.
+
+TF/02 There have been two changes concerned with submission mode:
+
+ Until now submission mode always left the return path alone, whereas
+ locally-submitted messages from untrusted users have the return path
+ fixed to the user's email address. Submission mode now fixes the return
+ path to the same address as is used to create the Sender: header. If
+ /sender_retain is specified then both the Sender: header and the return
+ path are left alone.
+
+ Note that the changes caused by submission mode take effect after the
+ predata ACL. This means that any sender checks performed before the
+ fix-ups will use the untrusted sender address specified by the user, not
+ the trusted sender address specified by submission mode. Although this
+ might be slightly unexpected, it does mean that you can configure ACL
+ checks to spot that a user is trying to spoof another's address, for
+ example.
+
+ There is also a new /name= option for submission mode which allows you
+ to specify the user's full name to be included in the Sender: header.
+ For example:
+
+ accept authenticated = *
+ control = submission/name=${lookup {$authenticated_id} \
+ lsearch {/etc/exim/namelist} }
+
+ The namelist file contains entries like
+
+ fanf: Tony Finch
+
+ And the resulting Sender: header looks like
+
+ Sender: Tony Finch <fanf@exim.org>
+
+TF/03 The control = fakereject ACL modifier now has a fakedefer counterpart,
+ which works in exactly the same way except it causes a fake SMTP 450
+ response after the message data instead of a fake SMTP 550 response.
+ You must take care when using fakedefer because it will cause messages
+ to be duplicated when the sender retries. Therefore you should not use
+ fakedefer if the message will be delivered normally.
+
+TF/04 There is a new ratelimit ACL condition which can be used to measure
+ and control the rate at which clients can send email. This is more
+ powerful than the existing smtp_ratelimit_* options, because those
+ options only control the rate of commands in a single SMTP session,
+ whereas the new ratelimit condition works across all connections
+ (concurrent and sequential) to the same host.
+
+ The syntax of the ratelimit condition is:
+
+ ratelimit = <m> / <p> / <options> / <key>
+
+ If the average client sending rate is less than m messages per time
+ period p then the condition is false, otherwise it is true.
+
+ The parameter p is the smoothing time constant, in the form of an Exim
+ time interval e.g. 8h for eight hours. A larger time constant means it
+ takes Exim longer to forget a client's past behaviour. The parameter m is
+ the maximum number of messages that a client can send in a fast burst. By
+ increasing both m and p but keeping m/p constant, you can allow a client
+ to send more messages in a burst without changing its overall sending
+ rate limit. Conversely, if m and p are both small then messages must be
+ sent at an even rate.
+
+ The key is used to look up the data used to calculate the client's
+ average sending rate. This data is stored in a database maintained by
+ Exim in its spool directory alongside the retry database etc. For
+ example, you can limit the sending rate of each authenticated user,
+ independent of the computer they are sending from, by setting the key
+ to $authenticated_id. The default key is $sender_host_address.
+ Internally, Exim includes the smoothing constant p and the options in
+ the lookup key because they alter the meaning of the stored data.
+ This is not true for the limit m, so you can alter the configured
+ maximum rate and Exim will still remember clients' past behaviour,
+ but if you alter the other ratelimit parameters Exim will effectively
+ forget their past behaviour.
+
+ Each ratelimit condition can have up to two options. The first option
+ specifies what Exim measures the rate of, and the second specifies how
+ Exim handles excessively fast clients. The options are separated by a
+ slash, like the other parameters.
+
+ The per_mail option means that it measures the client's rate of sending
+ messages. This is the default if none of the per_* options is specified.
+
+ The per_conn option means that it measures the client's connection rate.
+
+ The per_byte option limits the sender's email bandwidth. Note that it
+ is best to use this option in the DATA ACL; if it is used in an earlier
+ ACL it relies on the SIZE parameter on the MAIL command, which may be
+ inaccurate or completely missing. You can follow the limit m in the
+ configuration with K, M, or G to specify limits in kilobytes,
+ megabytes, or gigabytes respectively.
+
+ The per_cmd option means that Exim recomputes the rate every time the
+ condition is processed, which can be used to limit the SMTP command rate.
+ The alias per_rcpt is provided for use in the RCPT ACL instead of per_cmd
+ to make it clear that the effect is to limit the rate at which recipients
+ are accepted. Note that in this case the rate limiting engine will see a
+ message with many recipients as a large high-speed burst.
+
+ If a client's average rate is greater than the maximum, the rate
+ limiting engine can react in two possible ways, depending on the
+ presence of the strict or leaky options. This is independent of the
+ other counter-measures (e.g. rejecting the message) that may be
+ specified by the rest of the ACL. The default mode is leaky, which
+ avoids a sender's over-aggressive retry rate preventing it from getting
+ any email through.
+
+ The strict option means that the client's recorded rate is always
+ updated. The effect of this is that Exim measures the client's average
+ rate of attempts to send email, which can be much higher than the
+ maximum. If the client is over the limit it will be subjected to
+ counter-measures until it slows down below the maximum rate. The
+ smoothing period determines the time it takes for a high sending rate
+ to decay exponentially to 37% of its peak value, which means that you
+ can work out the time (the number of smoothing periods) that a client
+ is subjected to counter-measures after an over-limit burst with the
+ formula ln(peakrate/maxrate).
+
+ The leaky option means that the client's recorded rate is not updated
+ if it is above the limit. The effect of this is that Exim measures the
+ client's average rate of successfully sent email, which cannot be
+ greater than the maximum. If the client is over the limit it will
+ suffer some counter-measures, but it will still be able to send email
+ at the configured maximum rate, whatever the rate of its attempts.
+
+ As a side-effect, the ratelimit condition will set the expansion
+ variables $sender_rate containing the client's computed rate,
+ $sender_rate_limit containing the configured value of m, and
+ $sender_rate_period containing the configured value of p.
+
+ Exim's other ACL facilities are used to define what counter-measures
+ are taken when the rate limit is exceeded. This might be anything from
+ logging a warning (e.g. while measuring existing sending rates in order
+ to define our policy), through time delays to slow down fast senders,
+ up to rejecting the message. For example,
+
+ # Log all senders' rates
+ warn
+ ratelimit = 0 / 1h / strict
+ log_message = Sender rate $sender_rate / $sender_rate_period
+
+ # Slow down fast senders
+ warn
+ ratelimit = 100 / 1h / per_rcpt / strict
+ delay = ${eval: $sender_rate - $sender_rate_limit }s
+
+ # Keep authenticated users under control
+ deny
+ ratelimit = 100 / 1d / strict / $authenticated_id
+
+ # System-wide rate limit
+ defer
+ message = Sorry, too busy. Try again later.
+ ratelimit = 10 / 1s / $primary_hostname
+
+ # Restrict incoming rate from each host, with a default rate limit
+ # set using a macro and special cases looked up in a table.
+ defer
+ message = Sender rate exceeds $sender_rate_limit \
+ messages per $sender_rate_period
+ ratelimit = ${lookup {$sender_host_address} \
+ cdb {DB/ratelimits.cdb} \
+ {$value} {RATELIMIT} }
+
+ Warning: if you have a busy server with a lot of ratelimit tests,
+ especially with the per_rcpt option, you may suffer from a performance
+ bottleneck caused by locking on the ratelimit hints database. Apart from
+ making your ACLs less complicated, you can reduce the problem by using a
+ RAM disk for Exim's hints directory, /var/spool/exim/db/. However this
+ means that Exim will lose its hints data after a reboot (including retry
+ hints, the callout cache, and ratelimit data).
+
+TK/01 Added an 'spf' lookup type that will return an SPF result for a given
+ email address (the key) and an IP address (the database):
+
+ ${lookup {tom@duncanthrax.net} spf{217.115.139.137}}
+
+ The lookup will return the same result strings as they can appear in
+ $spf_result (pass,fail,softfail,neutral,none,err_perm,err_temp). The
+ lookup is armored in EXPERIMENTAL_SPF. Currently, only IPv4 addresses
+ are supported.
+
+ Patch submitted by Chris Webb <chris@arachsys.com>.
+
+PH/02 There's a new verify callout option, "fullpostmaster", which first acts
+ as "postmaster" and checks the recipient <postmaster@domain>. If that
+ fails, it tries just <postmaster>, without a domain, in accordance with
+ the specification in RFC 2821.
+
+PH/03 The action of the auto_thaw option has been changed. It no longer applies
+ to frozen bounce messages.
+
+TK/02 There are two new expansion items to help with the implementation of
+ the BATV "prvs" scheme in an Exim configuration:
+
+
+ ${prvs {<ADDRESS>}{<KEY>}{[KEYNUM]}}
+
+ The "prvs" expansion item takes three arguments: A qualified RFC2821
+ email address, a key and an (optional) key number. All arguments are
+ expanded before being used, so it is easily possible to lookup a key
+ and key number using the address as the lookup key. The key number is
+ optional and defaults to "0". The item will expand to a "prvs"-signed
+ email address, to be typically used with the "return_path" option on
+ a smtp transport. The decision if BATV should be used with a given
+ sender/recipient pair should be done on router level, to avoid having
+ to set "max_rcpt = 1" on the transport.
+
+
+ ${prvscheck {<ADDRESS>}{<SECRET>}{<RETURN_STRING>}}
+
+ The "prvscheck" expansion item takes three arguments. Argument 1 is
+ expanded first. When the expansion does not yield a SYNTACTICALLY
+ valid "prvs"-scheme address, the whole "prvscheck" item expands to
+ the empty string. If <ADDRESS> is a "prvs"-encoded address after
+ expansion, two expansion variables are set up:
- 4. The value of address_data from a sender verification is now available in
- $sender_address_data in subsequent conditions in the ACL statement. Note:
- this is just like $address_data. The value does not persist after the end
- of the current ACL statement. If you want to preserve it, you can use one
- of the ACL variables.
+ $prvscheck_address Contains the "prvs"-decoded version of
+ the address from argument 1.
- 5. The redirect router has two new options: forbid_sieve_filter and
- forbid_exim_filter. When filtering is enabled by allow_filter, these
- options control which type(s) of filtering are permitted. By default, both
- Exim and Sieve filters are allowed.
+ $prvscheck_keynum Contains the key number extracted from
+ the "prvs"-address in argument 1.
- 6. A new option for callouts makes it possible to set a different (usually
- smaller) timeout for making the SMTP connection. The keyword is "connect".
- For example:
+ These two variables can be used in the expansion code of argument 2
+ to retrieve the <SECRET>. The VALIDITY of the "prvs"-signed address
+ is then checked. The result is stored in yet another expansion
+ variable:
- verify = sender/callout=5s,connect=1s
+ $prvscheck_result Contains the result of a "prvscheck"
+ expansion: Unset (the empty string) for
+ failure, "1" for success.
- If not specified, it defaults to the general timeout value.
+ The "prvscheck" expansion expands to the empty string if <ADDRESS>
+ is not a SYNTACTICALLY valid "prvs"-scheme address. Otherwise,
+ argument 3 defines what "prvscheck" expands to: If argument 3
+ is the empty string, "prvscheck" expands to the decoded version
+ of the address (no matter if it is CRYPTOGRAPHICALLY valid or not).
+ If argument 3 expands to a non-empty string, "prvscheck" expands
+ to that string.
- 7. The new variables $sender_verify_failure and $recipient_verify_failure
- contain information about exactly what failed. In an ACL, after one of
- these failures, the relevant variable contains one of the following words:
- qualify the address was unqualified (no domain), and the message
- was neither local nor came from an exempted host;
+ Usage example
+ -------------
- route routing failed;
+ Macro:
- mail routing succeeded, and a callout was attempted; rejection
- occurred at or before the MAIL command (that is, on initial
- connection, HELO, or MAIL);
+ PRVSCHECK_SQL = ${lookup mysql{SELECT secret FROM batv_prvs WHERE \
+ sender='${quote_mysql:$prvscheck_address}'}{$value}}
- recipient the RCPT command in a callout was rejected;
+ RCPT ACL:
- postmaster the postmaster check in a callout was rejected.
+ # Bounces: drop unsigned addresses for BATV senders
+ deny message = This address does not send an unsigned reverse path.
+ senders = :
+ recipients = +batv_recipients
- The main use of these variables is expected to be to distinguish between
- rejections of MAIL and rejections of RCPT.
+ # Bounces: In case of prvs-signed address, check signature.
+ deny message = Invalid reverse path signature.
+ senders = :
+ condition = ${prvscheck {$local_part@$domain}{PRVSCHECK_SQL}{1}}
+ !condition = $prvscheck_result
- 8. The command line option -dd behaves exactly like -d except when used on a
- command that starts a daemon process. In that case, debugging is turned off
- for the subprocesses that the daemon creates. Thus, it is useful for
- monitoring the behaviour of the daemon without creating as much output as
- full debugging.
+ Top-Level Router:
- 9. $host_address is now set to the target address during the checking of
- ignore_target_hosts.
+ batv_redirect:
+ driver = redirect
+ data = ${prvscheck {$local_part@$domain}{PRVSCHECK_SQL}{}}
+ Transport (referenced by router that makes decision if
+ BATV is applicable):
+ external_smtp_batv:
+ driver = smtp
+ return_path = ${prvs {$return_path} \
+ {${lookup mysql{SELECT \
+ secret FROM batv_prvs WHERE \
+ sender='${quote_mysql:$sender_address}'} \
+ {$value}fail}}}
-Version 4.43
-------------
+PH/04 There are two new options that control the retrying done by the daemon
+ at startup when it cannot immediately bind a socket (typically because
+ the socket is already in use). The default values reproduce what were
+ built-in constants previously: daemon_startup_retries defines the number
+ of retries after the first failure (default 9); daemon_startup_sleep
+ defines the length of time to wait between retries (default 30s).
- 1. There is a new Boolean global option called mua_wrapper, defaulting false.
- This causes Exim to run an a restricted mode, in order to provide a very
- specific service.
-
- Background: On a personal computer, it is a common requirement for all
- email to be sent to a smarthost. There are plenty of MUAs that can be
- configured to operate that way, for all the popular operating systems.
- However, there are MUAs for Unix-like systems that cannot be so configured:
- they submit messages using the command line interface of
- /usr/sbin/sendmail. In addition, utility programs such as cron submit
- messages this way.
-
- Requirement: The requirement is for something that can provide the
- /usr/sbin/sendmail interface and deliver messages to a smarthost, but not
- provide any queueing or retrying facilities. Furthermore, the delivery to
- the smarthost should be synchronous, so that if it fails, the sending MUA
- is immediately informed. In other words, we want something that in effect
- converts a command-line MUA into a TCP/SMTP MUA.
-
- Solutions: There are a number of applications (for example, ssmtp) that do
- this job. However, people have found them to be lacking in various ways.
- For instance, some sites want to allow aliasing and forwarding before
- sending to the smarthost.
-
- Using Exim: Exim already had the necessary infrastructure for doing this
- job. Just a few tweaks were needed to make it behave as required, though it
- is somewhat of an overkill to use a fully-featured MTA for this purpose.
-
- Setting mua_wrapper=true causes Exim to run in a special mode where it
- assumes that it is being used to "wrap" a command-line MUA in the manner
- just described.
-
- If you set mua_wrapper=true, you also need to provide a compatible router
- and transport configuration. Typically there will be just one router and
- one transport, sending everything to a smarthost.
-
- When run in MUA wrapping mode, the behaviour of Exim changes in the
- following ways:
-
- (a) A daemon cannot be run, nor will Exim accept incoming messages from
- inetd. In other words, the only way to submit messages is via the
- command line.
-
- (b) Each message is synchonously delivered as soon as it is received (-odi
- is assumed). All queueing options (queue_only, queue_smtp_domains,
- control=queue, control=freeze in an ACL etc.) are quietly ignored. The
- Exim reception process does not finish until the delivery attempt is
- complete. If the delivery was successful, a zero return code is given.
-
- (c) Address redirection is permitted, but the final routing for all
- addresses must be to the same remote transport, and to the same list of
- hosts. Furthermore, the return_address must be the same for all
- recipients, as must any added or deleted header lines. In other words,
- it must be possible to deliver the message in a single SMTP
- transaction, however many recipients there are.
-
- (d) If the conditions in (c) are not met, or if routing any address results
- in a failure or defer status, or if Exim is unable to deliver all the
- recipients successfully to one of the hosts immediately, delivery of
- the entire message fails.
-
- (e) Because no queueing is allowed, all failures are treated as permanent;
- there is no distinction between 4xx and 5xx SMTP response codes from
- the smarthost. Furthermore, because only a single yes/no response can
- be given to the caller, it is not possible to deliver to some
- recipients and not others. If there is an error (temporary or
- permanent) for any recipient, all are failed.
-
- (f) If more than one host is listed, Exim will try another host after a
- connection failure or a timeout, in the normal way. However, if this
- kind of failure happens for all the hosts, the delivery fails.
-
- (g) When delivery fails, an error message is written to the standard error
- stream (as well as to Exim's log), and Exim exits to the caller with a
- return code value 1. The message is expunged from Exim's spool files.
- No bounce messages are ever generated.
-
- (h) No retry data is maintained, and any retry rules are ignored.
-
- (i) A number of Exim options are overridden: deliver_drop_privilege is
- forced true, max_rcpt in the smtp transport is forced to "unlimited",
- remote_max_parallel is forced to one, and fallback hosts are ignored.
-
- The overall effect is that Exim makes a single synchronous attempt to
- deliver the message, failing if there is any kind of problem. Because no
- local deliveries are done and no daemon can be run, Exim does not need root
- privilege. It should be possible to run it setuid=exim instead of
- setuid=root. See section 48.3 in the 4.40 manual for a general discussion
- about the advantages and disadvantages of running without root privilege.
-
- 2. There have been problems with DNS servers when SRV records are looked up.
- Some mis-behaving servers return a DNS error or timeout when a non-existent
- SRV record is sought. Similar problems have in the past been reported for
- MX records. The global dns_again_means_nonexist option can help with this
- problem, but it is heavy-handed because it is a global option. There are
- now two new options for the dnslookup router. They are called
- srv_fail_domains and mx_fail_domains. In each case, the value is a domain
- list. If an attempt to look up an SRV or MX record results in a DNS failure
- or "try again" response, and the domain matches the relevant list, Exim
- behaves as if the DNS had responded "no such record". In the case of an SRV
- lookup, this means that the router proceeds to look for MX records; in the
- case of an MX lookup, it proceeds to look for A or AAAA records, unless the
- domain matches mx_domains.
-
- 3. The following functions are now available in the local_scan() API:
-
- (a) void header_remove(int occurrence, uschar *name)
-
- This function removes header lines. If "occurrence" is zero or negative,
- all occurrences of the header are removed. If occurrence is greater
- than zero, that particular instance of the header is removed. If no
- header(s) can be found that match the specification, the function does
- nothing.
-
- (b) BOOL header_testname(header_line *hdr, uschar *name, int length,
- BOOL notdel)
-
- This function tests whether the given header has the given name. It
- is not just a string comparison, because whitespace is permitted
- between the name and the colon. If the "notdel" argument is TRUE, a
- FALSE return is forced for all "deleted" headers; otherwise they are
- not treated specially. For example:
-
- if (header_testname(h, US"X-Spam", 6, TRUE)) ...
-
- (c) void header_add_at_position(BOOL after, uschar *name, BOOL topnot,
- int type, char *format, ...)
-
- This function adds a new header line at a specified point in the header
- chain. If "name" is NULL, the new header is added at the end of the
- chain if "after" is TRUE, or at the start if "after" is FALSE. If
- "name" is not NULL, the headers are searched for the first non-deleted
- header that matches the name. If one is found, the new header is added
- before it if "after" is FALSE. If "after" is true, the new header is
- added after the found header and any adjacent subsequent ones with the
- same name (even if marked "deleted"). If no matching non-deleted header
- is found, the "topnot" option controls where the header is added. If it
- is TRUE, addition is at the top; otherwise at the bottom. Thus, to add
- a header after all the Received: headers, or at the top if there are no
- Received: headers, you could use
-
- header_add_at_position(TRUE, US"Received", TRUE, ' ', "X-xxx: ...");
-
- Normally, there is always at least one non-deleted Received: header,
- but there may not be if received_header_text expands to an empty
- string.
-
- (d) BOOL receive_remove_recipient(uschar *recipient)
-
- This is a convenience function to remove a named recipient from the
- list of recipients. It returns TRUE if a recipient was removed, and
- FALSE if no matching recipient could be found. The argument must be a
- complete email address.
-
- 4. When an ACL "warn" statement adds one or more header lines to a message,
- they are added at the end of the existing header lines by default. It is
- now possible to specify that any particular header line should be added
- right at the start (before all the Received: lines) or immediately after
- the first block of Received: lines in the message. This is done by
- specifying :at_start: or :after_received: (or, for completeness, :at_end:)
- before the text of the header line. (Header text cannot start with a colon,
- as there has to be a header name first.) For example:
-
- warn message = :after_received:X-My-Header: something or other...
-
- If more than one header is supplied in a single warn statement, each one is
- treated independently and can therefore be placed differently. If you add
- more than one line at the start, or after the Received: block, they will
- end up in reverse order.
-
- Warning: This facility currently applies only to header lines that are
- added in an ACL. It does NOT work for header lines that are added in a
- system filter or in a router or transport.
-
- 5. There is now a new error code that can be used in retry rules. Its name is
- "rcpt_4xx", and there are three forms. A literal "rcpt_4xx" matches any 4xx
- error received for an outgoing SMTP RCPT command; alternatively, either the
- first or both of the x's can be given as digits, for example: "rcpt_45x" or
- "rcpt_436". If you want (say) to recognize 452 errors given to RCPT
- commands by a particular host, and have only a one-hour retry for them, you
- can set up a retry rule of this form:
-
- the.host.name rcpt_452 F,1h,10m
-
- Naturally, this rule must come before any others that would match.
-
- These new errors apply to both outgoing SMTP (the smtp transport) and
- outgoing LMTP (either the lmtp transport, or the smtp transport in LMTP
- mode). Note, however, that they apply only to responses to RCPT commands.
-
- 6. The "postmaster" option of the callout feature of address verification has
- been extended to make it possible to use a non-empty MAIL FROM address when
- checking a postmaster address. The new suboption is called "postmaster_
- mailfrom", and you use it like this:
-
- require verify = sender/callout=postmaster_mailfrom=abc@x.y.z
-
- Providing this suboption causes the postmaster check to be done using the
- given address. The original "postmaster" option is equivalent to
-
- require verify = sender/callout=postmaster_mailfrom=
-
- If both suboptions are present, the rightmost one overrides.
-
- Important notes:
-
- (1) If you use a non-empty sender address for postmaster checking, there is
- the likelihood that the remote host will itself initiate a callout
- check back to your host to check that address. As this is a "normal"
- callout check, the sender will most probably be empty, thus avoiding
- possible callout loops. However, to be on the safe side it would be
- best to set up your own ACLs so that they do not do sender verification
- checks when the recipient is the address you use for postmaster callout
- checking.
-
- (2) The caching arrangements for postmaster checking do NOT take account of
- the sender address. It is assumed that either the empty address, or a
- fixed non-empty address will be used. All that Exim remembers is that
- the postmaster check for the domain succeeded or failed.
-
- 7. When verifying addresses in header lines using the verify=header_sender
- option, Exim behaves by default as if the addresses are envelope sender
- addresses from a message. Callout verification therefore tests to see
- whether a bounce message could be delivered, by using an empty address in
- the MAIL FROM command. However, it is arguable that these addresses might
- never be used as envelope senders, and could therefore justifiably reject
- bounce messages (empty senders). There is now an additional callout option
- for verify=header_sender that allows you to specify what address to use in
- the MAIL FROM command. You use it as in this example:
-
- require verify = header_sender/callout=mailfrom=abcd@x.y.z
-
- Important notes:
-
- (1) As in the case of postmaster_mailfrom (see above), you should think
- about possible loops.
-
- (2) In this case, as in the case of recipient callouts with non-empty
- senders (the use_sender option), caching is done on the basis of a
- recipient/sender pair.
-
- 8. If you build Exim with USE_READLINE=yes in Local/Makefile, it will try to
- load libreadline dynamically whenever the -be (test expansion) option is
- used without command line arguments. If successful, it will then use
- readline() for reading the test data. A line history is supported. By the
- time Exim does this, it is running as the calling user, so this should not
- cause any security problems. Security is the reason why this is NOT
- supported for -bt or -bv, when Exim is running as root or exim,
- respectively. Note that this option adds to the size of the Exim binary,
- because the dynamic loading library is not otherwise included. On my
- desktop it adds about 2.5K. You may need to add -ldl to EXTRA_LIBS when you
- set USE_READLINE=yes.
-
- 9. Added ${str2b64:<string>} to the expansion operators. This operator
- converts an arbitrary string into one that is base64 encoded.
-
-10. A new authenticator, called cyrus_sasl, has been added. This requires
- the presence of the Cyrus SASL library; it authenticates by calling this
- library, which supports a number of authentication mechanisms, including
- PLAIN and LOGIN, but also several others that Exim does not support
- directly. The code for this authenticator was provided by Matthew
- Byng-Maddick of A L Digital Ltd (http://www.aldigital.co.uk). Here follows
- draft documentation:
-
- xx. THE CYRUS_SASL AUTHENTICATOR
-
- The cyrus_sasl authenticator provides server support for the Cyrus library
- Implementation of the RFC 2222 "Simple Authentication and Security Layer".
- It provides a gatewaying mechanism directly to the Cyrus interface, so if
- your Cyrus library can do, for example, CRAM-MD5, then so can the
- cyrus_sasl authenticator. By default it uses the public name of the driver
- to determine which mechanism to support.
-
- Where access to some kind of secret file is required, for example in GSSAPI
- or CRAM-MD5, it is worth noting that the authenticator runs as the exim
- user, and that the Cyrus SASL library has no way of escalating privileges
- by default. You may also find you need to set environment variables,
- depending on the driver you are using.
-
- xx.1 Using cyrus_sasl as a server
-
- The cyrus_sasl authenticator has four private options. It puts the username
- (on a successful authentication) into $1.
-
- server_hostname Type: string* Default: $primary_hostname
-
- This option selects the hostname that is used when communicating with
- the library. It is up to the underlying SASL plug-in what it does with
- this data.
-
- server_mech Type: string Default: public_name
-
- This option selects the authentication mechanism this driver should
- use. It allows you to use a different underlying mechanism from the
- advertised name. For example:
-
- sasl:
- driver = cyrus_sasl
- public_name = X-ANYTHING
- server_mech = CRAM-MD5
- server_set_id = $1
-
- server_realm Type: string Default: unset
-
- This is the SASL realm that the server is claiming to be in.
-
- server_service Type: string Default: "smtp"
-
- This is the SASL service that the server claims to implement.
-
- For straigthforward cases, you do not need to set any of the
- authenticator's private options. All you need to do is to specify an
- appropriate mechanism as the public name. Thus, if you have a SASL library
- that supports CRAM-MD5 and PLAIN, you might have two authenticators as
- follows:
-
- sasl_cram_md5:
- driver = cyrus_sasl
- public_name = CRAM-MD5
- server_set_id = $1
-
- sasl_plain:
- driver = cyrus_sasl
- public_name = PLAIN
- server_set_id = $1
-
-11. There is a new global option called tls_on_connect_ports. Its value must be
- a list of port numbers; the most common use is expected to be
-
- tls_on_connect_ports = 465
-
- Setting this option has the same effect as -tls-on-connect on the command
- line, but only for the specified ports. It applies to all connections, both
- via the daemon and via inetd. You still need to specify all the ports for
- the daemon (using daemon_smtp_ports or local_interfaces or the -X command
- line option) because this option does not add an extra port -- rather, it
- specifies different behaviour on a port that is defined elsewhere. The
- -tls-on-connect command line option overrides tls_on_connect_ports, and
- forces tls-on-connect for all ports.
-
-12. There is a new ACL that is run when a DATA command is received, before the
- data itself is received. The ACL is defined by acl_smtp_predata. (Compare
- acl_smtp_data, which is run after the data has been received.)
- This new ACL allows a negative response to be given to the DATA command
- itself. Header lines added by MAIL or RCPT ACLs are not visible at this
- time, but any that are defined here are visible when the acl_smtp_data ACL
- is run.
-
-13. The "control=submission" ACL modifier has an option "/domain=xxx" which
- specifies the domain to be used when creating From: or Sender: lines using
- the authenticated id as a local part. If the option is supplied with an
- empty domain, that is, just "/domain=", Exim assumes that the authenticated
- id is a complete email address, and it uses it as is when creating From:
- or Sender: lines.
-
-14. It is now possible to make retry rules that apply only when the failing
- message has a specific sender. In particular, this can be used to define
- retry rules that apply only to bounce messages. The syntax is to add a new
- third item to a retry rule, of the form "senders=<address list>". The retry
- timings themselves then become the fourth item. For example:
-
- * * senders=: F,1h,30m
-
- would match all bounce messages. If the address list contains white space,
- it must be enclosed in quotes. For example:
-
- a.domain timeout senders="x@b.dom : y@c.dom" G,8h,10m,1.5
-
- When testing retry rules using -brt, you can supply a sender using the -f
- command line option, like this:
-
- exim -f "" -brt user@dom.ain
-
- If you do not set -f with -brt, a retry rule that contains a senders list
- will never be matched.
-
-15. Two new control modifiers have been added to ACLs: "control = enforce_sync"
- and "control = no_enforce_sync". This makes it possible to be selective
- about when SMTP synchronization is enforced. The global option
- smtp_enforce_sync now specifies the default state of the switch. These
- controls can appear in any ACL, but the most obvious place to put them is
- in the ACL defined by acl_smtp_connect, which is run at the start of an
- incoming SMTP connection, before the first synchronization check.
-
-16. Another two new control modifiers are "control = caseful_local_part" and
- "control = caselower_local_part". These are permitted only in the ACL
- specified by acl_smtp_rcpt (i.e. during RCPT processing). By default, the
- contents of $local_part are lower cased before ACL processing.
- After "control = caseful_local_part", any uppercase letters in the original
- local part are restored in $local_part for the rest of the ACL, or until
- "control = caselower_local_part" is encountered. However, this applies only
- to local part handling that takes place directly in the ACL (for example,
- as a key in lookups). If a "verify = recipient" test is obeyed, the
- case-related handling of the local part during the verification is
- controlled by the router configuration (see the caseful_local_part generic
- router option).
-
- This facility could be used, for example, to add a spam score to local
- parts containing upper case letters. For example, using $acl_m4 to
- accumulate the spam score:
-
- warn control = caseful_local_part
- set acl_m4 = ${eval:\
- $acl_m4 + \
- ${if match{$local_part}{[A-Z]}{1}{0}}\
- }
- control = caselower_local_part
-
- Notice that we put back the lower cased version afterwards, assuming that
- is what is wanted for subsequent tests.
-
-17. The option hosts_connection_nolog is provided so that certain hosts can be
- excepted from logging when the +smtp_connection log selector is set. For
- example, you might want not to log SMTP connections from local processes,
- or from 127.0.0.1, or from your local LAN. The option is a host list with
- an unset default. Because it is consulted in the main loop of the daemon,
- you should strive to restrict its value to a short inline list of IP
- addresses and networks. To disable logging SMTP connections from local
- processes, you must create a host list with an empty item. For example:
-
- hosts_connection_nolog = :
-
- If the +smtp_connection log selector is not set, this option has no effect.
-
-18. There is now an acl called acl_smtp_quit, which is run for the QUIT
- command. The outcome of the ACL does not affect the response code to QUIT,
- which is always 221. Thus, the ACL does not in fact control any access.
- For this reason, the only verbs that are permitted are "accept" and "warn".
-
- The ACL can be used for tasks such as custom logging at the end of an SMTP
- session. For example, you can use ACL variables in other ACLs to count
- messages, recipients, etc., and log the totals at QUIT time using one or
- more "logwrite" modifiers on a "warn" command.
-
- You do not need to have a final "accept", but if you do, you can use a
- "message" modifier to specify custom text that is sent as part of the 221
- response.
-
- This ACL is run only for a "normal" QUIT. For certain kinds of disastrous
- failure (for example, failure to open a log file, or when Exim is bombing
- out because it has detected an unrecoverable error), all SMTP commands
- from the client are given temporary error responses until QUIT is received
- or the connection is closed. In these special cases, the ACL is not run.
-
-19. The appendfile transport has two new options, mailbox_size and mailbox_
- filecount. If either these options are set, it is expanded, and the result
- is taken as the current size of the mailbox or the number of files in the
- mailbox, respectively. This makes it possible to use some external means of
- maintaining the data about the size of a mailbox for enforcing quota
- limits. The result of expanding these option values must be a decimal
- number, optionally followed by "K" or "M".
-
-20. It seems that there are broken clients in use that cannot handle multiline
- SMTP responses. Can't people who implement these braindead programs read?
- RFC 821 mentions multiline responses, and it is over 20 years old. They
- must handle multiline responses for EHLO, or do they still use HELO?
- Anyway, here is YAWFAB (yet another workaround for asinine brokenness).
- There's a new ACL switch that can be set by
-
- control = no_multiline_responses
-
- If this is set, it suppresses multiline SMTP responses from ACL rejections.
- One way of doing this would have been just to put out these responses as
- one long line. However, RFC 2821 specifies a maximum of 512 bytes per
- response ("use multiline responses for more" it says), and some of the
- responses might get close to that. So I have implemented this by doing two
- very easy things:
-
- (1) Extra information that is normally output as part of a rejection
- caused by sender verification failure is omitted. Only the final line
- (typically "sender verification failed") is now sent.
-
- (2) If a "message" modifier supplies a multiline response, only the first
- line is output.
-
- The setting of the switch can, of course, be made conditional on the
- calling host.
-
-21. There is now support for the libradius library that comes with FreeBSD.
- This is an alternative to the radiusclient library that Exim already
- supports. To use the FreeBSD library, you need to set
-
- RADIUS_LIB_TYPE=RADLIB
-
- in Local/Makefile, in addition to RADIUS_CONFIGURE_FILE, and you probably
- also need -libradius in EXTRALIBS.
-
-
-Version 4.42
-------------
+PH/05 There is now a new ${if condition called "match_ip". It is similar to
+ match_domain, etc. It must be followed by two argument strings. The first
+ (after expansion) must be an IP address or an empty string. The second
+ (after expansion) is a restricted host list that can match only an IP
+ address, not a host name. For example:
- 1. The "personal" filter test is brought up-to-date with recommendations from
- the Sieve specification: (a) The list of non-personal From: addresses now
- includes "listserv", "majordomo", and "*-request"; (b) If the message
- contains any header line starting with "List=-" it is treated as
- non-personal.
+ ${if match_ip{$sender_host_address}{1.2.3.4:5.6.7.8}{...}{...}}
- 2. The Sieve functionality has been extended to support the "copy" and
- "vacation" extensions, and comparison tests.
+ The specific types of host list item that are permitted in the list are
+ shown below. Consult the manual section on host lists for further
+ details.
- 3. There is now an overall timeout for performing a callout verification. It
- defaults to 4 times the callout timeout, which applies to individual SMTP
- commands during the callout. The overall timeout applies when there is more
- than one host that can be tried. The timeout is checked before trying the
- next host. This prevents very long delays if there are a large number of
- hosts and all are timing out (e.g. when the network connections are timing
- out). The value of the overall timeout can be changed by specifying an
- additional sub-option for "callout", called "maxwait". For example:
+ . An IP address, optionally with a CIDR mask.
- verify = sender/callout=5s,maxwait=20s
+ . A single asterisk matches any IP address.
- 4. Changes to the "personal" filter test:
+ . An empty item matches only if the IP address is empty. This could be
+ useful for testing for a locally submitted message or one from specific
+ hosts in a single test such as
- (1) The list of non-personal local parts in From: addresses has been
- extended to include "listserv", "majordomo", "*-request", and "owner-*",
- taken from the Sieve specification recommendations.
+ ${if match_ip{$sender_host_address}{:4.3.2.1:...}{...}{...}}
- (2) If the message contains any header line starting with "List-" it is
- treated as non-personal.
+ where the first item in the list is the empty string.
- (3) The test for "circular" in the Subject: header line has been removed
- because it now seems ill-conceived.
+ . The item @[] matches any of the local host's interface addresses.
- 5. The autoreply transport has a new option called never_mail. This is an
- address list. If any run of the transport creates a message with a
- recipient that matches any item in the list, that recipient is quietly
- discarded. If all recipients are discarded, no message is created.
-
-
-Version 4.40
-------------
+ . Lookups are assumed to be "net-" style lookups, even if "net-" is not
+ specified. Thus, the following are equivalent:
-The documentation is up-to-date for the 4.40 release. What follows here is a
-brief list of the new features that have been added since 4.30.
+ ${if match_ip{$sender_host_address}{lsearch;/some/file}...
+ ${if match_ip{$sender_host_address}{net-lsearch;/some/file}...
- 1. log_incoming_interface affects more log lines.
+ You do need to specify the "net-" prefix if you want to specify a
+ specific address mask, for example, by using "net24-".
- 2. New ACL modifier "control = submission".
+PH/06 The "+all" debug selector used to set the flags for all possible output;
+ it is something that people tend to use semi-automatically when
+ generating debug output for me or for the list. However, by including
+ "+memory", an awful lot of output that is very rarely of interest was
+ generated. I have changed this so that "+all" no longer includes
+ "+memory". However, "-all" still turns everything off.
- 3. CONFIGURE_OWNER can be set at build time to define an alternative owner for
- the configuration file, in addition to root and exim.
- 4. Added expansion variables $body_zerocount, $recipient_data, and
- $sender_data.
-
- 5. The time of last modification of the "new" subdirectory is now used as the
- "mailbox time last read" when there is a quota error for a maildir
- delivery.
-
- 6. The special item "+ignore_unknown" may now appear in host lists.
-
- 7. The special domain-matching patterns @mx_any, @mx_primary, and
- @mx_secondary can now be followed by "/ignore=<ip list>".
-
- 8. New expansion conditions: match_domain, match_address, match_local_part,
- lt, lti, le, lei, gt, gti, ge, and new expansion operators time_interval,
- eval10, and base62d.
+Version 4.51
+------------
- 9. New lookup type called "iplsearch".
+PH/01 The format in which GnuTLS parameters are written to the gnutls-param
+ file in the spool directory has been changed. This change has been made
+ to alleviate problems that some people had with the generation of the
+ parameters by Exim when /dev/random was exhausted. In this situation,
+ Exim would hang until /dev/random acquired some more entropy.
-10. New log selectors ident_timeout, tls_certificate_verified, queue_time,
- deliver_time, outgoing_port, return_path_on_delivery.
+ The new code exports and imports the DH and RSA parameters in PEM
+ format. This means that the parameters can be generated externally using
+ the certtool command that is part of GnuTLS.
-11. New global options smtp_active_hostname and tls_require_ciphers.
+ To replace the parameters with new ones, instead of deleting the file
+ and letting Exim re-create it, you can generate new parameters using
+ certtool and, when this has been done, replace Exim's cache file by
+ renaming. The relevant commands are something like this:
-12. Exinext has -C and -D options.
+ # rm -f new.params
+ # touch new.params
+ # chown exim:exim new.params
+ # chmod 0400 new.params
+ # certtool --generate-privkey --bits 512 >new.params
+ # echo "" >>new.params
+ # certtool --generate-dh-params --bits 1024 >> new.params
+ # mv new.params params
-13. "domainlist_cache" forces caching of an apparently variable list.
+ If Exim never has to generate the parameters itself, the possibility of
+ stalling is removed.
-14. For compatibility with Sendmail, the command line option -prval:sval
- is equivalent to -oMr rval -oMs sval.
+PH/02 A new expansion item for dynamically loading and calling a locally-
+ written C function is now provided, if Exim is compiled with
-15. New callout options use_sender and use_postmaster for use when verifying
- recipients.
+ EXPAND_DLFUNC=yes
-16. John Jetmore's "exipick" utility has been added to the distribution.
+ set in Local/Makefile. The facility is not included by default (a
+ suitable error is given if you try to use it when it is not there.)
-17. The TLS code now supports CRLs.
+ If you enable EXPAND_DLFUNC, you should also be aware of the new redirect
+ router option forbid_filter_dlfunc. If you have unprivileged users on
+ your system who are permitted to create filter files, you might want to
+ set forbid_filter_dlfunc=true in the appropriate router, to stop them
+ using ${dlfunc to run code within Exim.
-18. The dnslookup router and the dnsdb lookup type now support the use of SRV
- records.
+ You load and call an external function like this:
+
+ ${dlfunc{/some/file}{function}{arg1}{arg2}...}
+
+ Once loaded, Exim remembers the dynamically loaded object so that it
+ doesn't reload the same object file in the same Exim process (but of
+ course Exim does start new processes frequently).
+
+ There may be from zero to eight arguments to the function. When compiling
+ a local function that is to be called in this way, local_scan.h should be
+ included. The Exim variables and functions that are defined by that API
+ are also available for dynamically loaded functions. The function itself
+ must have the following type:
+
+ int dlfunction(uschar **yield, int argc, uschar *argv[])
+
+ Where "uschar" is a typedef for "unsigned char" in local_scan.h. The
+ function should return one of the following values:
+
+ OK Success. The string that is placed in "yield" is put into
+ the expanded string that is being built.
+
+ FAIL A non-forced expansion failure occurs, with the error
+ message taken from "yield", if it is set.
+
+ FAIL_FORCED A forced expansion failure occurs, with the error message
+ taken from "yield" if it is set.
+
+ ERROR Same as FAIL, except that a panic log entry is written.
+
+ When compiling a function that is to be used in this way with gcc,
+ you need to add -shared to the gcc command. Also, in the Exim build-time
+ configuration, you must add -export-dynamic to EXTRALIBS.
+
+TF/01 $received_time is a new expansion variable containing the time and date
+ as a number of seconds since the start of the Unix epoch when the
+ current message was received.
+
+PH/03 There is a new value for RADIUS_LIB_TYPE that can be set in
+ Local/Makefile. It is RADIUSCLIENTNEW, and it requests that the new API,
+ in use from radiusclient 0.4.0 onwards, be used. It does not appear to be
+ possible to detect the different versions automatically.
+
+PH/04 There is a new option called acl_not_smtp_mime that allows you to scan
+ MIME parts in non-SMTP messages. It operates in exactly the same way as
+ acl_smtp_mime
+
+PH/05 It is now possible to redefine a macro within the configuration file.
+ The macro must have been previously defined within the configuration (or
+ an included file). A definition on the command line using the -D option
+ causes all definitions and redefinitions within the file to be ignored.
+ In other words, -D overrides any values that are set in the file.
+ Redefinition is specified by using '==' instead of '='. For example:
+
+ MAC1 = initial value
+ ...
+ MAC1 == updated value
+
+ Redefinition does not alter the order in which the macros are applied to
+ the subsequent lines of the configuration file. It is still the same
+ order in which the macros were originally defined. All that changes is
+ the macro's value. Redefinition makes it possible to accumulate values.
+ For example:
+
+ MAC1 = initial value
+ ...
+ MAC1 == MAC1 and something added
+
+ This can be helpful in situations where the configuration file is built
+ from a number of other files.
+
+PH/06 Macros may now be defined or redefined between router, transport,
+ authenticator, or ACL definitions, as well as in the main part of the
+ configuration. They may not, however, be changed within an individual
+ driver or ACL, or in the local_scan, retry, or rewrite sections of the
+ configuration.
+
+PH/07 $acl_verify_message is now set immediately after the failure of a
+ verification in an ACL, and so is available in subsequent modifiers. In
+ particular, the message can be preserved by coding like this:
-19. The redirect router has a new option called qualify_domain.
+ warn !verify = sender
+ set acl_m0 = $acl_verify_message
-20. exigrep's output now also includes lines that are not related to any
- particular message, but which do match the pattern.
+ Previously, $acl_verify_message was set only while expanding "message"
+ and "log_message" when a very denied access.
+
+PH/08 The redirect router has two new options, sieve_useraddress and
+ sieve_subaddress. These are passed to a Sieve filter to specify the :user
+ and :subaddress parts of an address. Both options are unset by default.
+ However, when a Sieve filter is run, if sieve_useraddress is unset, the
+ entire original local part (including any prefix or suffix) is used for
+ :user. An unset subaddress is treated as an empty subaddress.
+
+PH/09 Quota values can be followed by G as well as K and M.
+
+PH/10 $message_linecount is a new variable that contains the total number of
+ lines in the header and body of the message. Compare $body_linecount,
+ which is the count for the body only. During the DATA and
+ content-scanning ACLs, $message_linecount contains the number of lines
+ received. Before delivery happens (that is, before filters, routers, and
+ transports run) the count is increased to include the Received: header
+ line that Exim standardly adds, and also any other header lines that are
+ added by ACLs. The blank line that separates the message header from the
+ body is not counted. Here is an example of the use of this variable in a
+ DATA ACL:
+
+ deny message = Too many lines in message header
+ condition = \
+ ${if <{250}{${eval: $message_linecount - $body_linecount}}}
+
+ In the MAIL and RCPT ACLs, the value is zero because at that stage the
+ message has not yet been received.
+
+PH/11 In a ${run expansion, the variable $value (which contains the standard
+ output) is now also usable in the "else" string.
+
+PH/12 In a pipe transport, although a timeout while waiting for the pipe
+ process to complete was treated as a delivery failure, a timeout while
+ writing the message to the pipe was logged, but erroneously treated as a
+ successful delivery. Such timeouts include transport filter timeouts. For
+ consistency with the overall process timeout, these timeouts are now
+ treated as errors, giving rise to delivery failures by default. However,
+ there is now a new Boolean option for the pipe transport called
+ timeout_defer, which, if set TRUE, converts the failures into defers for
+ both kinds of timeout. A transport filter timeout is now identified in
+ the log output.
+
+
+Version 4.50
+------------
-21. New global option write_rejectlog. If it is set false, Exim no longer
- writes anything to the reject log.
+The documentation is up-to-date for the 4.50 release.
****