1 EXPORTABLE EXIM TEST SUITE
2 --------------------------
4 This document last updated for:
6 Test Suite Version: 4.87
13 For a long time, the Exim test suite was confined to Philip Hazel's
14 workstation, because it relied on that particular environment. The problem is
15 that an MTA such as Exim interacts a great deal with its environment, so if you
16 run it somewhere else, the output will be different, which makes automatic
17 checking difficult. Even in a single environment, things are not all that easy.
18 For instance, if Exim delivers a message, the log line (which one would want to
19 compare) contains a timestamp and an Exim message id that will be different
20 each time. This issue is dealt with by a Perl script that munges the output by
21 recognizing changing sequences and replacing them with fixed values before
22 doing a comparison. Another problem with exporting the original test suite is
23 that it assumes a version of Exim with more or less every optional feature
26 This README describes a new test suite that is intended to be exportable and to
27 run in a number of different environments. The tests themselves are in no
28 particular order; they accumulated over the years as Exim was extended and
29 modified. They vary greatly in size and complexity. Some were specifically
30 constructed to test new features; others were made to demonstrate that a bug
33 A few of the original tests have had to be omitted from this more general
34 suite because differences in operating system behaviour make it impossible to
35 generalize them. An example is a test that uses a version of Exim that is
36 setuid to the Exim user rather than root, with the deliver_drop_privilege
37 option set. In Linux, such a binary is able to deliver a message as the caller
38 of Exim, because it can revert to the caller's uid. In FreeBSD this is not the
45 In order to run this test suite, the following requirements must be met:
47 (1) You should run the tests on a matching version of Exim, because the suite
48 is continuously updated to test the latest features and bug fixes. The
49 version you test does not, however, have to be installed as the live
50 version. You can of course try the tests on any version of Exim, but some
51 may fail. In particular, the test suite will fall apart horrible with
52 versions of Exim prior to 4.54.
54 (2) You can use any non-root login to run the tests, but there must be access
55 via "sudo" to root from this login. Privilege is required to override
56 configuration change checks and for things like cleaning up spool files,
57 but on the other hand, the tests themselves need to call Exim from a
58 non-root process. The use of "sudo" is the easiest way to achieve all this.
59 The test script uses "sudo" to do a number of things as root, so it is best
60 if you set a sudo timeout so that you do not have to keep typing a
61 password. For example, if you put
63 Defaults timestamp_timeout=480
65 in /etc/sudoers, a password lasts for 8 hours (a working day). It is
66 not permitted to run the tests as the Exim user because the test suite
67 tracks the two users independently. Using the same user would result
68 in false positives on some tests.
70 Further, some tests invoke sudo in an environment where there might not be
71 a TTY, so tickets should be global, not per-TTY. Taking this all together
72 and assuming a user of "exim-build", you might have this in sudoers:
74 Defaults:exim-build timestamp_timeout=480,!tty_tickets
76 (3) The login under which you run the tests must have the exim group as a
77 secondary so that it has access to logs, spool files, etc. However, it
78 should have a different primary group (eg. "users" vs. "eximgroup"). The
79 login should not be one of the names "userx", "usery", "userz", or a few
80 other simple ones such as "abcd" and "xyz" and single letters that are used
81 in the tests. The test suite expects the login to have a gecos name; I think
82 it will now run if the gecos field is empty but there may be anomalies.
83 The login must not contain a dash or an equal sign. (Otherwise some tests
84 about local_from_{suffix,prefix} will fail.)
86 (4) The directory into which you unpack the test suite must be accessible by
87 the Exim user, so that code running as exim can access the files therein.
88 This includes search-access on all path elements leading to it. A
89 world-readable directory is fine. However, there may be problems if the
90 path name of the directory is excessively long. This is because it
91 sometimes appears in log lines or debug output, and if it is truncated, it
92 is no longer recognized.
94 (5) Exim must be built with its user and group specified at build time, and
95 with certain minimum facilities, namely:
97 Routers: accept, dnslookup, manualroute, redirect
98 Transports: appendfile, autoreply, pipe, smtp
100 Authenticators: plaintext
102 Most Exim binaries will have these included.
104 (6) A C compiler is needed to build some test programs, and the test script is
105 written in Perl, so you need that.
107 (7) Some of the tests run Exim as a daemon, and others use a testing server
108 (described below). These require TCP ports. In the configurations and
109 scripts, the ports are parameterized, but at present, fixed values are
110 written into the controlling script. These are ports 1224 to 1229. If these
111 ports are not available for use, some of the tests will fail.
113 (8) There is an underlying assumption that the host on which the tests are
114 being run has an IPv4 address (which the test script seeks out). If there
115 is also an IPv6 address, additional tests are run when the Exim binary
116 contains IPv6 support. There are checks in the scripts for a running IPv4
117 interface; when one is not found, some tests are skipped (with a warning
118 message). The local net may not be in 10.0/8 as that is used by the suite.
120 (9) Exim must be built with TRUSTED_CONFIG_LIST support, so that the test
121 configs can be placed into it. A suitable file location is .../exim/test/trusted_configs
122 with content .../exim/test/test-config [fill out the ... to make full
123 paths]. This file should be owner/group matching CONFIGURE_OWNER/GROUP,
124 or root/root, and it has to be accessible for the login, under which
125 you run the tests. The config files in .../exim/test/confs/ should be
126 owner/group the same. DISABLE_D_OPTION must not be used. If ALT_CONFIG_PREFIX is used, it
127 must contain the directory of the test-suite. WHITELIST_D_MACROS should contain:
129 DIR:EXIM_PATH:AA:ACL:ACLRCPT:ACL_MAIL:ACL_PREDATA:ACL_RCPT:AFFIX:ALLOW:ARG1:ARG2:AUTHF:AUTHS:AUTH_ID_DOMAIN:BAD:BANNER:BB:BR:BRB:CERT:COM:COMMAND_USER:CONNECTCOND:CONTROL:CREQCIP:CREQMAC:CRL:CSS:D6:DATA:DCF:DDF:DEFAULTDWC:DELAY:DETAILS:DRATELIMIT:DYNAMIC_OPTION:ELI:ERROR_DETAILS:ERT:FAKE:FALLBACK:FILTER:FILTER_PREPEND_HOME:FORBID:FORBID_SMTP_CODE:FUSER:HAI:HAP:HARDLIMIT:HEADER_LINE_MAXSIZE:HEADER_MAXSIZE:HELO_MSG:HL:HOSTS:HOSTS_AVOID_TLS:HOSTS_MAX_TRY:HVH:IFACE:IGNORE_QUOTA:INC:INSERT:IP1:IP2:LAST:LDAPSERVERS:LENCHECK:LIMIT:LIST:LOG_SELECTOR:MAXNM:MESSAGE_LOGS:MSIZE:NOTDAEMON:ONCE:ONLY:OPT:OPTION:ORDER:PAH:PEX:PORT:PTBC:QDG:QOLL:QUOTA:QUOTA_FILECOUNT:QWM:RCPT_MSG:REMEMBER:REQUIRE:RETRY:RETRY1:RETRY2:RETURN:RETURN_ERROR_DETAILS:REWRITE:ROUTE_DATA:RRATELIMIT:SELECTOR:SELF:SERVER:SERVERS:SREQCIP:SREQMAC:SRV:STRICT:SUB:SUBMISSION_OPTIONS:TIMEOUTDEFER:TIMES:TRUSTED:TRYCLEAR:UL:USE_SENDER:UTF8:VALUE:WMF
131 (10) Exim must *not* be built with USE_READLINE, as the test-suite's automation
132 assumes the simpler I/O model.
133 Exim must *not* be built with HEADERS_CHARSET set to UTF-8.
140 If the Exim binary that is being tested contains extra functionality in
141 addition to the minimum specified above, additional tests are run to exercise
142 the extra functionality, except for a few special cases such as the databases
143 (MySQL, PostgreSQL, LDAP) where special data is needed for the tests.
146 RUNNING THE TEST SUITE
147 ----------------------
149 (1) Download the tarball exim-testsuite-x.xx.tar.bz2 and unpack it, preferably
150 in a directory alongside an Exim source directory (see below).
152 (2) cd into the exim-testsuite-x.xx directory.
154 (3) Run "autoconf" then "./configure" and then "make". This builds a few
155 auxiliary programs that are written in C.
157 (4) echo $PWD/test-config >> your_TRUSTED_CONFIG_LIST_filename
158 Typically that is .../exim/test/trusted_configs
160 (5) Run "./runtest" (a Perl script) as described below.
162 (6) If you want to see what tests are available, run "./listtests".
165 BREAKING OUT OF THE TEST SCRIPT
166 -------------------------------
168 If you abandon the test run by typing ^C, the interrupt may be passed to a
169 program that the script is running, or it may be passed to the script itself.
170 In the former case, the script should detect that the program has ended
171 abnormally. In both cases, the script tries to clean up everything, including
172 killing any Exim daemons that it has started. However, there may be race
173 conditions in which the clean up does not happen. If, after breaking out of a
174 run, you see strange errors in the next run, look for any left-over Exim
175 daemons, and kill them by hand.
181 The individual test scripts are in subdirectories of the "scripts" directory.
182 If you do not supply any arguments to ./listtests, it scans all the scripts in
183 all the directories, and outputs the heading line from each script. The output
184 is piped through "less", and begins like this:
187 Basic/0001 Basic configuration setting
188 Basic/0002 Common string expansions
189 Basic/0003 Caseless address blocking
192 Lines that start === give the name of the subdirectory containing the test
193 scripts that follow. If you supply an argument to ./listtests, it is used as a
194 Perl pattern to match case-independently against the names of the
195 subdirectories. Only those that match are scanned. For example, "./listtests
198 === 1000-Basic-ipv6 ===
199 === Requires: support IPv6
200 Basic-ipv6/1000 -bh and non-canonical IPv6 addresses
201 Basic-ipv6/1001 recognizing IPv6 address in HELO/EHLO
203 === 2250-dnsdb-ipv6 ===
204 === Requires: support IPv6
206 dnsdb-ipv6/2250 dnsdb ipv6 lookup in string expansions
208 If you supply a second argument to ./listtests, it is used as a Perl pattern to
209 match case-independently against the individual script titles. For example,
210 "./listtests . mx" lists all tests whose titles contain "mx", because "."
211 matches all the subdirectory names.
217 If you do not supply any arguments to ./runtest, it searches for an Exim
218 source tree at the same level as the test suite directory. A source tree
219 is a source tree, if it contains a build-* directory.
221 It then looks for an Exim binary in a "build" directory of that source
222 tree. If there are several Exim source trees, it chooses the latest
223 version of Exim. Consider the following example:
226 exim-4.60/ exim-4.62/ exim-testsuite-x.xx/
228 A simple ./runtest from within the test suite will use a 4.62 binary if it
229 finds one, otherwise a 4.60 binary. If a binary cannot be found, the script
230 prompts for one. Alternatively, you can supply the binary on the command line:
232 ./runtest /usr/exim/bin/exim
234 A matching test suite is released with each Exim release; if you use a test
235 suite that does not match the binary, some tests may fail.
237 The test suite uses some of the Exim utilities (such as exim_dbmbuild), and it
238 expects to find them in the same directory as Exim itself. If they are not
239 found, the tests that use them are omitted. A suitable comment is output.
241 On the ./runtest command line, following the name of the binary, if present,
242 there may be a number of options and then one or two numbers. The full syntax
245 ./runtest [binary name] [runtest options] [exim options] \
246 [first test] [last test]
248 There are some options for the ./runtest script itself:
250 -CONTINUE This will allow the script to move past some failing tests. It will
251 write a simple failure line with the test number in a temporary
252 logfile test/failed-summary.log. Unexpected exit codes will still
253 stall the test execution and require interaction.
255 -DEBUG This option is for debugging the test script. It causes some
256 tracing information to be output.
258 -DIFF By default, file comparisons are done using a private compare
259 command called "cf", which is built from source that is provided in
260 the src directory. This is a command I've had for nearly 20 years -
261 look at the source comments for its history - whose output I
262 prefer. However, if you want to use "diff" instead, give -DIFF as a
263 runtest option. In that case, "diff -u" is used for comparisons.
264 (If it turns out that most people prefer to use diff, I'll change
269 This allows "overrides" for the test results. It's intended
270 use is to deal with distro specific differences in the test
271 output. The default flavour is "foo". If during the test
272 run differences between the current and the expected output
273 are found and no flavour file exists already, you may update
274 the "common" expected output or you may create a flavour
275 file. If a flavour file already exists, any updates will go
276 into that flavour file!
278 -KEEP Normally, after a successful run, the test output files are
279 deleted. This option prevents this. It is useful when running a
280 single test, in order to look at the actual output before it is
281 modified for comparison with saved output.
283 -NOIPV4 Pretend that an IPv4 interface was not found. This is useful for
284 testing that the test suite correctly skips tests that require
285 a running IPv4 interface.
287 -NOIPV6 Pretend that an IPv6 interface was not found. This is useful for
288 testing that the test suite correctly skips tests that require
289 a running IPv6 interface.
291 -UPDATE If this option is set, any detected changes in test output are
292 automatically accepted and used to update the stored copies of the
293 output. It is a dangerous option, but it useful for the test suite
294 maintainer after making a change to the code that affects a lot of
295 tests (for example, the wording of a message).
297 The options for ./runtest must be given first (but after the name of the
298 binary, if present). Any further options, that is, items on the command line
299 that start with a hyphen, are passed to the Exim binary when it is run as part
300 of a test. The only sensible use of this is to pass "-d" in order to run a test
301 with debugging enabled. Any other options are likely to conflict with options
302 that are set in the tests. Some tests are already set up to run with debugging.
303 In these cases, -d on the command line overrides their own debug settings.
305 The final two arguments specify the range of tests to be run. Test numbers lie
306 in the range 1 to 9999. If no numbers are given, the defaults are 1 and 8999
307 (sic). Tests with higher numbers (9000 upwards) are not run automatically
308 because they require specific data (such as a particular MySQL table) that is
309 unlikely to be generally available.
311 Tests that require certain optional features of Exim are grouped by number, so
312 in any given range, not all the tests will exist. Non-existent tests are just
313 skipped, but if there are no tests at all in the given range, a message is
316 If you give only one number, just that test is run (if it exists). Instead of a
317 second number, you can give the character "+", which is interpreted as "to the
318 end". Normally this is 8999; if the starting number is 9000 or higher, "+" is
319 interpreted as 9999. Examples:
323 ./runtest /usr/sbin/exim 5000 +
324 ./runtest -DIFF -d 81
326 When the script starts up, the first thing it does is to check that you have
327 sudo access to root. Then it outputs the version number of the Exim binary that
328 it is testing, and also information about the optional facilities that are
329 present (obtained from "exim -bV"). This is followed by some environmental
330 information, including the current login id and the hosts's IP address. The
331 script checks that the current user is in the Exim group, and that the Exim
332 user has access to the test suite directory.
334 The script outputs the list of tests requested, and a list of tests that will
335 be omitted because the relevant optional facilities are not in the binary. You
336 are then invited to press Return to start the tests running.
342 When all goes well, the only permanent output is the identity of the tests as
343 they are run, and "Script completed" for each test script, for example:
345 Basic/0001 Basic configuration setting
347 Basic/0002 Basic string expansions
349 Basic/0003 Caseless address blocking
351 Basic/0004 Caseful address blocking
353 Basic/0005 -bs to simple local delivery
356 While a script is running, it shows "Test n" on the screen, for each of the
357 Exim tests within the script. There may also be comments from some tests when a
358 delay is expected, for example, if there is a "sleep" while testing a timeout.
360 Before each set of optional tests, an extra identifying line is output. For
363 >>> The following tests require: authenticator cram_md5
364 CRAM-MD5/2500 CRAM-MD5 server tests
366 CRAM-MD5/2501 CRAM-MD5 client tests
369 If a test fails, you are shown the output of the text comparison that failed,
370 and prompted as to what to do next. The output is shown using the "less"
371 command, or "more" if "less" is not available. The options for "less" are set
372 to that it automatically exits if there is less that a screenful of output. By
373 default, the output is from the "cf" program, and might look like this:
375 DBM/1300 DBM files and exim_dbmbuild
377 Lines 7-9 of "test-stdout-munged" do not match lines 7-11 of "stdout/1300".
379 exim_dbmbuild exit code = 1
380 Continued set of lines is too long: max permitted length is 99999
381 exim_dbmbuild exit code = 1
384 exim_dbmbuild exit code = 2
385 Continued set of lines is too long: max permitted length is 99999
387 exim_dbmbuild exit code = 2
390 "test-stdout-munged" contains 16 lines; "stdout/1300" contains 18 lines.
392 Continue, Retry, Update & retry, Quit? [Q]
394 This example was generated by running the test with a version of Exim
395 that had a bug in the exim_dbmbuild utility (the bug was fixed at release
396 4.53). See "How the tests work" below for a description of the files that are
397 used. In this case, the standard output differed from what was expected.
399 The reply to the prompt must either be empty, in which case it takes the
400 default that is given in brackets (in this case Q), or a single letter, in
401 upper or lower case (in this case, one of C, R, U, or Q). If you type anything
402 else, the prompt is repeated.
404 "Continue" carries on as if the files had matched; that is, it ignores the
405 mismatch. Any other output files for the same test will be compared before
406 moving on to the next test.
408 "Update & retry" copies the new file to the saved file, and reruns the test
409 after doing any further comparisons that may be necessary.
411 "Retry" does the same apart from the file copy.
413 Other circumstances give rise to other prompts. If a test generates output for
414 which there is no saved data, the prompt (after a message stating which file is
415 unexpectely not empty) is:
417 Continue, Show, or Quit? [Q]
419 "Show" displays the data on the screen, and then you get the "Continue..."
420 prompt. If a test ends with an unexpected return code, the prompt is:
422 show stdErr, show stdOut, Continue (without file comparison), or Quit? [Q]
424 Typically in these cases there will be something interesting in the stderr
425 or stdout output. There is a similar prompt after the "server" auxiliary
429 OPENSSL AND GNUTLS ERROR MESSAGES
430 ---------------------------------
432 Some of the TLS tests deliberately cause errors to check how Exim handles them.
433 It has been observed that different releases of the OpenSSL and GnuTLS
434 libraries generate different error messages. This may cause the comparison with
435 the saved output to fail. Such errors can be ignored.
441 . Some of the tests are time-sensitive (e.g. when testing timeouts, as in test
442 461). These may fail if run on a host that is also running a lot of other
445 . Some versions of "ls" use a different format for times and dates. This can
446 cause test 345 to fail.
448 . Test 0142 tests open file descriptors; on some hosts the output may vary.
450 . Some tests may fail, for example 0022, because it says it uses cached data
451 when the expected output thinks it should not be in cache. Item #5 in the
452 Requirements section has:
453 "Exim must be built with its user and group specified at build time"
454 This means that you cannot use the "ref:username" in your Local/Makefile
455 when building the exim binary, in any of the following fields:
456 EXIM_USER EXIM_GROUP CONFIGURE_OWNER CONFIGURE_GROUP
458 . If the runtest script warns that the hostname is not a Fully Qualified
459 Domain Name (FQDN), expect that some tests will fail, for example 0036,
460 with an extra log line saying the hostname doesn't resolve. You must use a
461 FQDN for the hostname for proper test functionality.
463 . If you change your hostname to a FQDN, you must delete the test/dnszones
464 subdirectory. When you next run the runtest script, it will rebuild the
465 content to use the new hostname.
467 . If your hostname has an uppercase characters in it, expect that some tests
468 will fail, for example, 0036, because some log lines will have the hostname
469 in all lowercase. The regex which extracts the hostname from the log lines
470 will not match the lowercased version.
472 . Some tests may fail, for example 0015, with a cryptic error message:
473 Server return code 99
474 Due to security concerns, some specific files MUST have the group write bit
475 off. For the purposes of the test suite, some test/aux-fixed/* files MUST
476 have the group write bit off, so it's easier to just remove the group write
477 bit for all of them. If your umask is set to 002, the group write bit will
478 be on by default and you'll see this problem, so make sure your umask is
479 022 and re-checkout the test/ subdirectory.
481 . Some tests will fail if the username and group name are different. It does
482 not have to be the primary group, a secondary group is sufficient.
485 OTHER SCRIPTS AND PROGRAMS
486 --------------------------
488 There is a freestanding Perl script called "listtests" that scans the test
489 scripts and outputs a list of all the tests, with a short descriptive comment
490 for each one. Special requirements for groups of tests are also noted.
492 The main runtest script makes use of a second Perl script and some compiled C
495 patchexim A Perl script that makes a patched version of Exim (see the
496 next section for details).
498 bin/cf A text comparison program (see above).
500 bin/checkaccess A program that is run as root; it changes uid/gid to the
501 Exim user and group, and then checks that it can access
502 files in the test suite's directory.
504 bin/client A script-driven SMTP client simulation.
506 bin/client-gnutls A script-driven SMTP client simulation with GnuTLS support.
507 This is built only if GnuTLS support is detected on the host.
509 bin/client-ssl A script-driven SMTP client simulation with OpenSSL support.
510 This is built only if OpenSSL support is detected on the
513 bin/fakens A fake "nameserver" for DNS tests (see below for details).
515 bin/fd A program that outputs details of open file descriptors.
517 bin/iefbr14 A program that does nothing, and returns 0. It's just like
518 the "true" command, but it is in a known place.
520 bin/loaded Some dynamically loaded functions for testing dlfunc support.
522 bin/mtpscript A script-driven SMTP/LMTP server simulation, on std{in,out}.
524 bin/server A script-driven SMTP server simulation, over a socket.
526 bin/showids Output the current uid, gid, euid, egid.
528 The runtest script also makes use of a number of ordinary commands such as
529 "cp", "kill", "more", and "rm", via the system() call. In some cases these are
530 run as root by means of sudo.
533 STANDARD SUBSTITUTIONS
534 ----------------------
536 In the following sections, there are several references to the "standard
537 substitutions". These make changes to some of the stored files when they are
538 used in a test. To save repetition, the substitutions themselves are documented
541 CALLER is replaced by the login name of the user running the tests
542 CALLERGROUP is replaced by the caller's group id
543 CALLER_GID is replaced by the caller's group id
544 CALLER_UID is replaced by the caller's user id
545 DIR is replaced by the name of the test-suite directory
546 EXIMGROUP is replaced by the name of the Exim group
547 EXIMUSER is replaced by the name of the Exim user
548 HOSTIPV4 is replaced by the local host's IPv4 address
549 HOSTIPV6 is replaced by the local host's IPv6 address
550 HOSTNAME is replaced by the local host's name
551 PORT_D is replaced by a port number for normal daemon use
552 PORT_N is replaced by a port number that should never respond
553 PORT_S is replaced by a port number for normal bin/server use
554 TESTNUM is replaced by the current test number
555 V4NET is replaced by an IPv4 network number for testing
556 V6NET is replaced by an IPv6 network number for testing
558 PORT_D is currently hard-wired to 1225, PORT_N to 1223, and PORT_S to 1224.
559 V4NET is hardwired to 224 and V6NET to ff00. These networks are used for DNS
560 testing purposes, and for testing Exim with -bh. The only requirement is that
561 they are networks that can never be used for an IP address of a real host. I've
562 chosen two multicast networks for the moment.
564 If the host has no IPv6 address, "<no IPv6 address found>" is substituted but
565 that does not matter because no IPv6 tests will be run. A similar substitution
566 is made if there is no IPv4 address, and again, tests that actually require a
567 running IPv4 interface should be skipped.
569 If the host has more than one IPv4 or IPv6 address, the first one that
570 "ifconfig" lists is used. If the only available address is 127.0.0.1 (or ::1
571 for IPv6) it is used, but another value is preferred if available.
573 In situations where a specific test is not being run (for example, when setting
574 up dynamic data files), TESTNUM is replaced by an empty string, but should not
575 in fact occur in such files.
581 Each numbered script runs Exim (sometimes several times) with its own Exim
582 configuration file. The configurations are stored in the "confs" directory,
583 and before running each test, a copy of the appropriate configuration, with the
584 standard substitutions, is made in the file test-config. The -C command line
585 option is used to tell Exim to use this configuration.
587 The -D option is used to pass the path of the Exim binary to the configuration.
588 This is not standardly substituted, because there are two possible binaries
589 that might be used in the same test (one setuid to root, the other to the exim
590 user). Some tests also make use of -D to vary the configuration for different
591 calls to the Exim binary.
593 Normally, of course, Exim gives up root privilege when -C and -D are used by
594 unprivileged users. We do not want this to happen when running the tests,
595 because we want to be able to test all aspects of Exim, including receiving
596 mail from unprivileged users. The way this is handled is as follows:
598 At the start of the runtest script, the patchexim script is run as root. This
599 script makes a copy of the Exim binary that is to be tested, patching it as it
600 does so. (This is a binary patch, not a source patch.) The patch causes the
601 binary, when run, to "know" that it is running in the test harness. It does not
602 give up root privilege when -C and -D are used, and in a few places it takes
603 other special actions, such as delaying when starting a subprocess to allow
604 debug output from the parent to be written first. If you want to know more,
605 grep the Exim source files for "running_in_test_harness".
607 The patched binary is placed in the directory eximdir/exim and given the normal
608 setuid root privilege. This is, of course, a dangerous binary to have lying
609 around, especially if there are unprivileged users on the system. To protect
610 it, the eximdir directory is created with the current user as owner, exim as
611 the group owner, and with access drwx--x---. Thus, only the user who is running
612 the tests (who is known to have access to root) and the exim user have access
613 to the modified Exim binary. When runtest terminates, the patched binary is
616 Each set of tests proceeds by interpreting its controlling script. The scripts
617 are in subdirectories of the "scripts" directory. They are split up according
618 to the requirements of the tests they contain, with the 0000-Basic directory
619 containing tests that can always be run. Run the "listtests" script to obtain a
626 Output from script runs is written to the files test-stdout and test-stderr.
627 When an Exim server is involved, test-stdout-server and test-stderr-server are
628 used for its output. Before being compared with the saved output, the
629 non-server and server files are concatenated, so a single saved file contains
632 A directory called spool is used for Exim's spool files, and for Exim logs.
633 These locations are specified in every test's configuration file.
635 When messages are delivered to files, the files are put in the test-mail
636 directory. Output from comparisons is written to test-cf.
638 Before comparisons are done, output texts are modified ("munged") to change or
639 remove parts that are expected to vary from run to run. The modified files all
640 end with the suffix "-munged". Thus, you will see test-stdout-munged,
641 test-mainlog-munged, test-mail-munged, and so on. Other files whose names start
642 with "test-" are created and used by some of the tests.
644 At the end of a successful test run, the spool directory and all the files
645 whose names begin with "test-" are removed. If the run ends unsuccessfully
646 (typically after a "Q" response to a prompt), the spool and test files are left
647 in existence so that the problem can be investigated.
653 Each test script consists of a list of commands, each optionally preceded by
654 comments (lines starting with #) and (also optionally) a line containing an
655 expected return code. Some of the commands are followed by data lines
656 terminated by a line of four asterisks.
658 The first line of each script must be a comment that briefly describes the
661 # -bS Use of HELO/RSET
663 A line consisting just of digits is interpreted as the expected return code
664 for the command that follows. The default expectation when no such line exists
665 is a zero return code. For example, here is a complete test script, containing
668 # -bS Unexpected EOF in headers
671 mail from:<someone@some.where>
672 rcpt to:<blackhole@HOSTNAME>
677 The expected return code in this case is 1, and the data lines are passed to
678 Exim on its standard input. Both the command line and the data lines have the
679 standard substitions applied to them. Thus, HOSTNAME in the example above will
680 be replaced by the local host's name. Long commands can be continued over
681 several lines by using \ as a continuation character. This does *not* apply to
684 Here follows a list of supported commands. They can be divided into two groups:
687 Commands with no input
688 ----------------------
690 These commands are not followed by any input data, or by a line of asterisks.
693 dbmbuild <file1> <file1>
695 This command runs the exim_dbmbuild utility to build a DBM file. It is used
696 only when DBM support is available in Exim, and typically follows the use of a
697 "write" command (see below) that creates the input file.
702 This command runs the exim_dumpdb utility on the testing spool directory, using
703 the database name given, for example: "dumpdb retry".
708 The text is written to the screen; this is used to output comments from
712 exim_lock [options] <file name>
714 This command runs the exim_lock utility with the given options and file name.
715 The file remains locked with the following command (normally exim) is obeyed.
720 This command runs the exinext utility with the given argument data.
725 This command runs the exigrep utility with the given data (the search pattern)
726 on the current mainlog file.
731 This command is present at the start of all but one of the tests that use
732 GnuTLS. It copies a pre-existing parameter file into the spool directory, so
733 that Exim does not have to re-create the file each time. The first GnuTLS test
734 does not do this, in order to test that Exim can create the file.
739 This command must be given in any script that starts an Exim daemon, normally
740 at the end. It searches for the PID file in the spool directory, and sends a
741 SIGINT signal to the Exim daemon process whose PID it finds. See below for
742 comments about starting Exim daemons.
747 This command causes the script to sleep for m milliseconds. Nothing is output
753 This command requests custom munging of the test outputs. The munge names
754 used are coded in the runtest script (look for 'name of munge').
759 This command must be at the head of a script. If no IPv4 interface has been
760 found, the entire script is skipped, and a comment is output.
765 This command must be at the head of a script. If no IPv6 interface has been
766 found, the entire script is skipped, and a comment is output.
771 This command must be at the head of a script. If the Exim binary does not
772 suppport large files (off_t is <= 4), the entire script is skipped, and a
776 need_move_frozen_messages
778 This command must be at the head of a script. If the Exim binary does not have
779 support for moving frozen messages (which is an optional feature), the entire
780 script is skipped, and a comment is output.
785 If this command is encountered anywhere in the script, messages that are
786 delivered when the script runs are not compared with saved versions.
791 If this command is encountered anywhere in the script, message log files that
792 are still in existence at the end of the run (for messages that were not
793 delivered) are not compared with saved versions.
798 If this command is encountered anywhere in the script, the stderr output from
799 the run is not compared with a saved version.
804 If this command is encountered anywhere in the script, the stdout output from
805 the run is not compared with a saved version.
810 This command indicates that the script is for a certain type of filter test, in
811 which there are a lot of repetitive stdout lines that get in the way, because
812 filter tests output data about the sender and recipient. Such lines are removed
813 from the stdout output before comparing, for ease of human perusal.
818 This command causes the script to sleep for n seconds. If n is greater than
819 one, "sleep <n>" is output to the screen, followed by a dot for every second
825 This command causes special sorting to occur on the mainlog file before
826 comparison. Every sequence of contiguous delivery lines (lines containing the
827 => -> or *> flags) is sorted. This is necessary in some tests that use parallel
828 deliveries because on different systems the processes may terminate in a
832 A number of standard file management commands are also recognized. These are
833 cat, chmod, chown, cp, du, ln, ls, du, mkdir, mkfifo, rm, rmdir, and touch.
834 Some are run as root using "sudo".
840 The remaining commands are followed by data lines for their standard input,
841 terminated by four asterisks. Even if no data is required for the particular
842 usage, the asterisks must be given.
847 This command takes one script line and runs it in the background,
848 in parallel with following commands. For external daemons, eg. redis-server.
851 catwrite <file name> [nxm[=start-of-line-text]]*
853 This command operates like the "write" command, which is described below,
854 except that the data it generates is copied to the end of the test-stdout file
855 as well as to the named file.
859 client [<options>] <ip address> <port> [<outgoing interface>]
861 This command runs the auxiliary "client" program that simulates an SMTP client.
862 It is controlled by a script read from its standard input, details of which are
863 given below. There are two options. One is -t, which must be followed directly
864 by a number, to specify the command timeout in seconds (e.g. -t5). The default
865 timeout is 5 seconds. The other option is -tls-on-connect, which causes the
866 client to try to start up a TLS session as soon as it has connected, without
867 using the STARTTLS command. The client program connects to the given IP address
868 and port, using the specified interface, if one is given.
871 client-ssl [<options>] <ip address> <port> [<outgoing interface>] \
872 [<cert file>] [<key file>]
874 When OpenSSL is available on the host, an alternative version of the client
875 program is compiled, one that supports TLS using OpenSSL. The additional
876 arguments specify a certificate and key file when required for the connection.
877 There are two additional options: -tls-on-connect, that causes the client to
878 initiate TLS negociation immediately on connection; -ocsp that causes the TLS
879 negotiation to include a certificate-status request. The latter takes a
880 filename argument, the CA info for verifying the stapled response.
883 client-gnutls [<options>] <ip address> <port> [<outgoing interface>] \
884 [<cert file>] [<key file>]
886 When GnuTLS is available on the host, an alternative version of the client
887 program is compiled, one that supports TLS using GnuTLS. The additional
888 arguments specify a certificate and key file when required. There is one
889 additional option, -tls-on-connect, that causes the client to initiate TLS
890 negotiation immediately on connection.
893 exim [<options>] [<arguments>]
895 This command runs the testing version of Exim. Any occurrence of "$msg1" in the
896 command line is replaced by the ID of the first (oldest) message in Exim's
897 (testing) spool. "$msg2" refers to the second, and so on. The name "exim" can
898 be preceded by an environment setting as in this example:
900 LDAPTLS_REQCERT=never exim -be
902 It can also be preceded by a number; this specifies a number of seconds to wait
903 before closing the stdout pipe to Exim, and is used for some timeout tests. For
908 Finally, "exim" can be preceded by "sudo", to run Exim as root. If more than
909 one of these prefixes is present, they must be in the above order.
911 If the options include "-DSERVER" but not "-DNOTDAEMON", the script waits for
912 Exim to start but then continues without waiting for it to terminate. Typically
913 this will be for a daemon-mode "-bd" operation. The daemon should be later
914 terminated using "killdaemon".
917 exim_exim [<options>] [<arguments>]
919 This runs an alternative version of Exim that is setuid to exim rather than to
923 server [<options>] <port or socket> [<connection count>]
925 This command runs the auxiliary "server" program that simulates an SMTP (or
926 other) server. It is controlled by a script that is read from its standard
927 input, details of which are given below. A number of options are implemented:
929 -d causes the server to output debugging information
931 -t <sec> sets a timeout (default 5) for when the server is
932 awaiting an incoming connection. If negative, the
933 absolute value is used and a timeout results in a
936 -noipv4 causes the server not to set up an IPv4 socket
938 -noipv6 causes the server not to set up an IPv6 socket
940 -i <sec> sets an initial pause, to delay before creating the listen sockets
942 By default, in an IPv6 environment, both kinds of socket are set up. However,
943 the test script knows which interfaces actually exist on the host, and it adds
944 -noipv4 or -noipv6 to the server command as required. An error occurs if both
945 these options are given.
947 The only required argument is either a port number or the path name of a Unix
948 domain socket. The port is normally PORT_S, which is changed to an actual
949 number by the standard substitutions. The optional final argument specifies the
950 number of different connections to expect (default 1). These must happen
951 serially (one at a time). There is no support for multiple simultaneous
952 connections. Here are some example commands:
955 server -t 10 PORT_S 3
956 server /tmp/somesocket
958 The following lines, up to a line of four asterisks, are the server's
959 controlling standard input (described below). These lines are read and
960 remembered; during the following commands, until an "exim" command is reached,
961 the server is run in parallel.
964 write <file name> [nxm[=start-of-line-text]]*
966 The "write" command is a way of creating files of specific sizes for buffering
967 tests, or containing specific data lines. Being able to do this from within the
968 script saves holding lots of little test files. The optional argument specifies
969 n lines of length m. The lines consist of the letter "a". If start of line text
970 is supplied, it replaces "a"s at the start of each line. Underscores in the
971 start of line text are turned into spaces. The optional argument may be
972 repeated. The data lines that follow a "write" command are split into two by a
973 line of four plus signs. Any above the split are written before the
974 fixed-length lines, and any below the split are written after. For example:
976 write test-data 3x30=AB_ 1x50
984 This command generates a file containing:
988 AB aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
989 AB aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
990 AB aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
991 aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
995 If there are no fixed-length line specifiers, there is no need to split the
996 data, and a line of plusses is not needed.
1001 This command runs Perl, with the data as its standard input, to allow arbitrary
1002 one-off things to be done.
1008 Lines in client scripts are of two kinds:
1010 (1) If a line begins with three question marks and a space, the rest of the
1011 line defines the start of expected output from the server. If what is
1012 received does not match, the client bombs out with an error message.
1014 (2) If a line starts with three plus signs followed by a space, the rest of the
1015 line specifies a number of seconds to sleep for before proceeding.
1017 (3) Otherwise, the line is an input line line that is sent to the server. Any
1018 occurrences of \r and \n in the line are turned into carriage return and
1019 linefeed, respectively. This is used for testing PIPELINING.
1021 Here is a simple example:
1023 client 127.0.0.1 PORT_D
1028 AUTH PLAIN AbdXi0AdnD2CVy
1034 In the case of client-gnutls and client-ssl, if a command is "starttls", this
1035 is remembered, and after a subsequent OK response, an attempt to move into TLS
1036 mode occurs. If a command is "starttls_wait", the client sends "starttls" but
1037 does not start up TLS; this is for testing timeouts. If a command is "stoptls",
1038 an existing TLS connection is shut down, but nothing is sent.
1044 The server program sleeps till a connection occurs or its timeout is reached,
1045 in which case it bombs out. The next set of command lines are interpreted. They
1046 are of the following kinds:
1048 (1) A line that starts with '>' or with a digit is an output line that is sent
1049 to the client. In the case of '>':
1051 (a) If the line starts with ">>", no terminating CRLF is sent.
1052 (b) If the line starts with ">CR>", just CR is sent at the end.
1053 (c) If the line starts with ">LF>", just LF is sent at the end.
1054 (d) If the line starts with ">*eof", nothing is sent and the connection
1057 The data that is sent starts after the initial '>' sequence. Within
1058 each line the sequence '\x' followed by two hex digits can be used
1059 to specify an arbitrary byte value. The sequence '\\' specifies a
1062 (2) A line that starts with "*sleep" specifies a number of seconds to wait
1065 (3) A line containing "*eof" specifies that the client is expected to close
1066 the connection at this point.
1068 (4) A line containing just '.' specifies that the client is expected to send
1069 many lines, terminated by one that contains just a dot.
1071 (5) Otherwise, the line defines the start of an input line that the client
1072 is expected to send. To allow for lines that start with digits, the line
1073 may start with '<', which is not taken as part of the input data. If the
1074 lines starts with '<<' then only the characters are expected; no return-
1075 linefeed terminator. If the input does not match, the server bombs out
1076 with an error message. Backslash-escape sequences may be used in the
1077 line content as for output lines.
1079 Here is a simple example of server use in a test script:
1097 After a "server" command in a test script, the server runs in parallel until an
1098 "exim" command is reached. The "exim" command attempts to deliver one or more
1099 messages to port PORT_S on the local host. When it has finished, the test
1100 script waits for the "server" process to finish.
1102 The "mtpscript" program is like "server", except that it uses stdin/stdout for
1103 its input and output instead of a script. However, it is not called from test
1104 scripts; instead it is used as the command for pipe transports in some
1105 configurations, to simulate non-socket LMTP servers.
1108 AUXILIARY DATA FILES
1109 --------------------
1111 Many of the tests make use of auxiliary data files. There are two types; those
1112 whose content is fixed, and those whose content needs to be varied according to
1113 the current environment. The former are kept in the directory aux-fixed. The
1114 latter are distributed in the directory aux-var-src, and copied with the
1115 standard substitutions into the directory aux-var at the start of each test
1118 Most of the auxiliary files have names that start with a test number,
1119 indicating that they are specific to that one test. A few fixed files (for
1120 example, some TLS certificates) are used by more than one test, and so their
1121 names are not of this form.
1123 There are also some auxilary DNS zone files, which are described in the next
1127 DNS LOOKUPS AND GETHOSTBYNAME
1128 -----------------------------
1130 The original test suite required special testing zones to be loaded into a
1131 local nameserver. This is no longer a requirement for the new suite. Instead, a
1132 program called fakens is used to simulate a nameserver. When Exim is running in
1133 the test harness, instead of calling res_search() - the normal call to the DNS
1134 resolver - it calls a testing function. This handles a few special names itself
1135 (for compatibility with the old test suite), but otherwise passes the query to
1138 The fakens program consults "zone files" in the directory called dnszones, and
1139 returns data in the standard resource record format for Exim to process as if
1140 it came from the DNS. However, if the requested domain is not in any of the
1141 zones that fakens knows about, it returns a special code that causes Exim to
1142 pass the query on to res_search(). The zone files are:
1144 db.test.ex A zone for the domain test.ex.
1145 db.ip4.10 A zone for one special case in 10.250.0.0/16 (see below)
1146 db.ip4.V4NET A zone for the domain V4NET.in-addr.arpa.
1147 db.ip4.127 A zone for the domain 127.in-addr.arpa.
1148 db.ip6.V6NET A zone for the domain inverted(V6NET).ip6.arpa.
1149 db.ip6.0 A zone for the domain 0.ip6.arpa.
1151 V4NET and V6NET are substituted with the current testing networks (see above).
1152 In the case of V6NET, the network is four hex digits, and it is split and
1153 inverted appropriately when setting up the zone.
1155 These fake zone files are built dynamically from sources in the dnszones-src
1156 directory by applying the standard substitutions. The test suite also builds
1157 dynamic zone files for the name of the current host and its IP address(es). The
1158 idea is that there should not be any need to rely on an external DNS.
1160 The fakens program handles some names programmatically rather than using the
1161 fake zone files. These are:
1163 manyhome.test.ex This name is used for testing hosts with ridiculously large
1164 numbers of IP addresses; 2048 IP addresses are generated
1165 and returned. Doing it this way saves having to make the
1166 interface to fakens handle more records that can fit in the
1167 data block. The addresses that are generated are in the
1168 10.250.0.0/16 network.
1170 test.again.dns This always provokes a TRY_AGAIN response, for testing the
1171 handling of temporary DNS error. If the full domain name
1172 starts with digits, a delay of that many seconds occurs.
1174 test.fail.dns This always provokes a NO_RECOVERY response, for testing
1175 DNS server failures.
1177 The use of gethostbyname() and its IPv6 friends is also subverted when Exim is
1178 running in the test harness. The test code handles a few special names
1179 directly; for all the others it uses DNS lookups, which are then handled as
1180 just described. Thus, the use of /etc/hosts is completely bypassed. The names
1181 that are specially handled are:
1183 localhost Always returns 127.0.0.1 or ::1, for IPv4 and IPv6 lookups,
1186 <an IP address> If the IP address is of the correct form for the lookup
1187 type (IPv4 or IPv6), it is returned. Otherwise a panic-die
1190 The reverse zone db.ip4.10 is provided just for the manyhome.test.ex case. It
1191 contains a single wildcard resource record. It also contains the line
1195 Whenever fakens finds this line in a zone file, it returns PASS_ON instead of
1196 HOST_NOT_FOUND. This causes Exim to pass the query to res_search().