4 This file contains descriptions of new features that have been added to Exim.
5 Before a formal release, there may be quite a lot of detail so that people can
6 test from the snapshots or the CVS before the documentation is updated. Once
7 the documentation is updated, this file is reduced to a short list.
12 1. New options for the ratelimit ACL condition: /count= and /unique=.
13 The /noupdate option has been replaced by a /readonly option.
15 2. The SMTP transport's protocol option may now be set to "smtps", to
16 use SSL-on-connect outbound.
18 3. New variable $av_failed, set true if the AV scanner deferred; ie, when
19 there is a problem talking to the AV scanner, or the AV scanner running.
21 4. New expansion conditions, "inlist" and "inlisti", which take simple lists
22 and check if the search item is a member of the list. This does not
23 support named lists, but does subject the list part to string expansion.
25 5. Unless the new EXPAND_LISTMATCH_RHS build option is set when Exim was
26 built, Exim no longer performs string expansion on the second string of
27 the match_* expansion conditions: "match_address", "match_domain",
28 "match_ip" & "match_local_part". Named lists can still be used.
34 1. The global option "dns_use_edns0" may be set to coerce EDNS0 usage on
35 or off in the resolver library.
41 1. In addition to the existing LDAP and LDAP/SSL ("ldaps") support, there
42 is now LDAP/TLS support, given sufficiently modern OpenLDAP client
43 libraries. The following global options have been added in support of
44 this: ldap_ca_cert_dir, ldap_ca_cert_file, ldap_cert_file, ldap_cert_key,
45 ldap_cipher_suite, ldap_require_cert, ldap_start_tls.
47 2. The pipe transport now takes a boolean option, "freeze_signal", default
48 false. When true, if the external delivery command exits on a signal then
49 Exim will freeze the message in the queue, instead of generating a bounce.
51 3. Log filenames may now use %M as an escape, instead of %D (still available).
52 The %M pattern expands to yyyymm, providing month-level resolution.
54 4. The $message_linecount variable is now updated for the maildir_tag option,
55 in the same way as $message_size, to reflect the real number of lines,
56 including any header additions or removals from transport.
58 5. When contacting a pool of SpamAssassin servers configured in spamd_address,
59 Exim now selects entries randomly, to better scale in a cluster setup.
65 1. SECURITY FIX: privilege escalation flaw fixed. On Linux (and only Linux)
66 the flaw permitted the Exim run-time user to cause root to append to
67 arbitrary files of the attacker's choosing, with the content based
68 on content supplied by the attacker.
70 2. Exim now supports loading some lookup types at run-time, using your
71 platform's dlopen() functionality. This has limited platform support
72 and the intention is not to support every variant, it's limited to
73 dlopen(). This permits the main Exim binary to not be linked against
74 all the libraries needed for all the lookup types.
80 NOTE: this version is not guaranteed backwards-compatible, please read the
83 1. A new main configuration option, "openssl_options", is available if Exim
84 is built with SSL support provided by OpenSSL. The option allows
85 administrators to specify OpenSSL options to be used on connections;
86 typically this is to set bug compatibility features which the OpenSSL
87 developers have not enabled by default. There may be security
88 consequences for certain options, so these should not be changed
91 2. A new pipe transport option, "permit_coredumps", may help with problem
92 diagnosis in some scenarios. Note that Exim is typically installed as
93 a setuid binary, which on most OSes will inhibit coredumps by default,
94 so that safety mechanism would have to be overridden for this option to
95 be able to take effect.
97 3. ClamAV 0.95 is now required for ClamAV support in Exim, unless
98 Local/Makefile sets: WITH_OLD_CLAMAV_STREAM=yes
99 Note that this switches Exim to use a new API ("INSTREAM") and a future
100 release of ClamAV will remove support for the old API ("STREAM").
102 The av_scanner option, when set to "clamd", now takes an optional third
103 part, "local", which causes Exim to pass a filename to ClamAV instead of
104 the file content. This is the same behaviour as when clamd is pointed at
105 a Unix-domain socket. For example:
107 av_scanner = clamd:192.0.2.3 1234:local
109 ClamAV's ExtendedDetectionInfo response format is now handled.
111 4. There is now a -bmalware option, restricted to admin users. This option
112 takes one parameter, a filename, and scans that file with Exim's
113 malware-scanning framework. This is intended purely as a debugging aid
114 to ensure that Exim's scanning is working, not to replace other tools.
115 Note that the ACL framework is not invoked, so if av_scanner references
116 ACL variables without a fallback then this will fail.
118 5. There is a new expansion operator, "reverse_ip", which will reverse IP
119 addresses; IPv4 into dotted quad, IPv6 into dotted nibble. Examples:
121 ${reverse_ip:192.0.2.4}
123 ${reverse_ip:2001:0db8:c42:9:1:abcd:192.0.2.3}
124 -> 3.0.2.0.0.0.0.c.d.c.b.a.1.0.0.0.9.0.0.0.2.4.c.0.8.b.d.0.1.0.0.2
126 6. There is a new ACL control called "debug", to enable debug logging.
127 This allows selective logging of certain incoming transactions within
128 production environments, with some care. It takes two options, "tag"
129 and "opts"; "tag" is included in the filename of the log and "opts"
130 is used as per the -d<options> command-line option. Examples, which
131 don't all make sense in all contexts:
134 control = debug/tag=.$sender_host_address
135 control = debug/opts=+expand+acl
136 control = debug/tag=.$message_exim_id/opts=+expand
138 7. It has always been implicit in the design and the documentation that
139 "the Exim user" is not root. src/EDITME said that using root was
140 "very strongly discouraged". This is not enough to keep people from
141 shooting themselves in the foot in days when many don't configure Exim
142 themselves but via package build managers. The security consequences of
143 running various bits of network code are severe if there should be bugs in
144 them. As such, the Exim user may no longer be root. If configured
145 statically, Exim will refuse to build. If configured as ref:user then Exim
146 will exit shortly after start-up. If you must shoot yourself in the foot,
147 then henceforth you will have to maintain your own local patches to strip
150 8. There is a new expansion operator, bool_lax{}. Where bool{} uses the ACL
151 condition logic to determine truth/failure and will fail to expand many
152 strings, bool_lax{} uses the router condition logic, where most strings
154 Note: bool{00} is false, bool_lax{00} is true.
156 9. Routers now support multiple "condition" tests,
158 10. There is now a runtime configuration option "tcp_wrappers_daemon_name".
159 Setting this allows an admin to define which entry in the tcpwrappers
160 config file will be used to control access to the daemon. This option
161 is only available when Exim is built with USE_TCP_WRAPPERS. The
162 default value is set at build time using the TCP_WRAPPERS_DAEMON_NAME
165 11. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] The default value for system_filter_user is now
166 the Exim run-time user, instead of root.
168 12. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] ALT_CONFIG_ROOT_ONLY is no longer optional and
169 is forced on. This is mitigated by the new build option
170 TRUSTED_CONFIG_LIST which defines a list of configuration files which
171 are trusted; one per line. If a config file is owned by root and matches
172 a pathname in the list, then it may be invoked by the Exim build-time
173 user without Exim relinquishing root privileges.
175 13. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] The Exim user is no longer automatically
176 trusted to supply -D<Macro[=Value]> overrides on the command-line. Going
177 forward, we recommend using TRUSTED_CONFIG_LIST with shim configs that
178 include the main config. As a transition mechanism, we are temporarily
179 providing a work-around: the new build option WHITELIST_D_MACROS provides
180 a colon-separated list of macro names which may be overridden by the Exim
181 run-time user. The values of these macros are constrained to the regex
182 ^[A-Za-z0-9_/.-]*$ (which explicitly does allow for empty values).
188 1. TWO SECURITY FIXES: one relating to mail-spools which are globally
189 writable, the other to locking of MBX folders (not mbox).
191 2. MySQL stored procedures are now supported.
193 3. The dkim_domain transport option is now a list, not a single string, and
194 messages will be signed for each element in the list (discarding
197 4. The 4.70 release unexpectedly changed the behaviour of dnsdb TXT lookups
198 in the presence of multiple character strings within the RR. Prior to 4.70,
199 only the first string would be returned. The dnsdb lookup now, by default,
200 preserves the pre-4.70 semantics, but also now takes an extended output
201 separator specification. The separator can be followed by a semicolon, to
202 concatenate the individual text strings together with no join character,
203 or by a comma and a second separator character, in which case the text
204 strings within a TXT record are joined on that second character.
205 Administrators are reminded that DNS provides no ordering guarantees
206 between multiple records in an RRset. For example:
208 foo.example. IN TXT "a" "b" "c"
209 foo.example. IN TXT "d" "e" "f"
211 ${lookup dnsdb{>/ txt=foo.example}} -> "a/d"
212 ${lookup dnsdb{>/; txt=foo.example}} -> "def/abc"
213 ${lookup dnsdb{>/,+ txt=foo.example}} -> "a+b+c/d+e+f"
219 1. Native DKIM support without an external library.
220 (Note that if no action to prevent it is taken, a straight upgrade will
221 result in DKIM verification of all signed incoming emails. See spec
222 for details on conditionally disabling)
224 2. Experimental DCC support via dccifd (contributed by Wolfgang Breyha).
226 3. There is now a bool{} expansion condition which maps certain strings to
227 true/false condition values (most likely of use in conjunction with the
228 and{} expansion operator).
230 4. The $spam_score, $spam_bar and $spam_report variables are now available
233 5. exim -bP now supports "macros", "macro_list" or "macro MACRO_NAME" as
234 options, provided that Exim is invoked by an admin_user.
236 6. There is a new option gnutls_compat_mode, when linked against GnuTLS,
237 which increases compatibility with older clients at the cost of decreased
238 security. Don't set this unless you need to support such clients.
240 7. There is a new expansion operator, ${randint:...} which will produce a
241 "random" number less than the supplied integer. This randomness is
242 not guaranteed to be cryptographically strong, but depending upon how
243 Exim was built may be better than the most naive schemes.
245 8. Exim now explicitly ensures that SHA256 is available when linked against
248 9. The transport_filter_timeout option now applies to SMTP transports too.
254 1. Preliminary DKIM support in Experimental.
260 1. The body_linecount and body_zerocount C variables are now exported in the
263 2. When a dnslists lookup succeeds, the key that was looked up is now placed
264 in $dnslist_matched. When the key is an IP address, it is not reversed in
265 this variable (though it is, of course, in the actual lookup). In simple
268 deny dnslists = spamhaus.example
270 the key is also available in another variable (in this case,
271 $sender_host_address). In more complicated cases, however, this is not
272 true. For example, using a data lookup might generate a dnslists lookup
275 deny dnslists = spamhaus.example/<|192.168.1.2|192.168.6.7|...
277 If this condition succeeds, the value in $dnslist_matched might be
278 192.168.6.7 (for example).
280 3. Authenticators now have a client_condition option. When Exim is running as
281 a client, it skips an authenticator whose client_condition expansion yields
282 "0", "no", or "false". This can be used, for example, to skip plain text
283 authenticators when the connection is not encrypted by a setting such as:
285 client_condition = ${if !eq{$tls_cipher}{}}
287 Note that the 4.67 documentation states that $tls_cipher contains the
288 cipher used for incoming messages. In fact, during SMTP delivery, it
289 contains the cipher used for the delivery. The same is true for
292 4. There is now a -Mvc <message-id> option, which outputs a copy of the
293 message to the standard output, in RFC 2822 format. The option can be used
294 only by an admin user.
296 5. There is now a /noupdate option for the ratelimit ACL condition. It
297 computes the rate and checks the limit as normal, but it does not update
298 the saved data. This means that, in relevant ACLs, it is possible to lookup
299 the existence of a specified (or auto-generated) ratelimit key without
300 incrementing the ratelimit counter for that key.
302 In order for this to be useful, another ACL entry must set the rate
303 for the same key somewhere (otherwise it will always be zero).
308 # Read the rate; if it doesn't exist or is below the maximum
310 deny ratelimit = 100 / 5m / strict / noupdate
311 log_message = RATE: $sender_rate / $sender_rate_period \
312 (max $sender_rate_limit)
314 [... some other logic and tests...]
316 warn ratelimit = 100 / 5m / strict / per_cmd
317 log_message = RATE UPDATE: $sender_rate / $sender_rate_period \
318 (max $sender_rate_limit)
319 condition = ${if le{$sender_rate}{$sender_rate_limit}}
323 6. The variable $max_received_linelength contains the number of bytes in the
324 longest line that was received as part of the message, not counting the
325 line termination character(s).
327 7. Host lists can now include +ignore_defer and +include_defer, analagous to
328 +ignore_unknown and +include_unknown. These options should be used with
329 care, probably only in non-critical host lists such as whitelists.
331 8. There's a new option called queue_only_load_latch, which defaults true.
332 If set false when queue_only_load is greater than zero, Exim re-evaluates
333 the load for each incoming message in an SMTP session. Otherwise, once one
334 message is queued, the remainder are also.
336 9. There is a new ACL, specified by acl_smtp_notquit, which is run in most
337 cases when an SMTP session ends without sending QUIT. However, when Exim
338 itself is is bad trouble, such as being unable to write to its log files,
339 this ACL is not run, because it might try to do things (such as write to
340 log files) that make the situation even worse.
342 Like the QUIT ACL, this new ACL is provided to make it possible to gather
343 statistics. Whatever it returns (accept or deny) is immaterial. The "delay"
344 modifier is forbidden in this ACL.
346 When the NOTQUIT ACL is running, the variable $smtp_notquit_reason is set
347 to a string that indicates the reason for the termination of the SMTP
348 connection. The possible values are:
350 acl-drop Another ACL issued a "drop" command
351 bad-commands Too many unknown or non-mail commands
352 command-timeout Timeout while reading SMTP commands
353 connection-lost The SMTP connection has been lost
354 data-timeout Timeout while reading message data
355 local-scan-error The local_scan() function crashed
356 local-scan-timeout The local_scan() function timed out
357 signal-exit SIGTERM or SIGINT
358 synchronization-error SMTP synchronization error
359 tls-failed TLS failed to start
361 In most cases when an SMTP connection is closed without having received
362 QUIT, Exim sends an SMTP response message before actually closing the
363 connection. With the exception of acl-drop, the default message can be
364 overridden by the "message" modifier in the NOTQUIT ACL. In the case of a
365 "drop" verb in another ACL, it is the message from the other ACL that is
368 10. For MySQL and PostgreSQL lookups, it is now possible to specify a list of
369 servers with individual queries. This is done by starting the query with
370 "servers=x:y:z;", where each item in the list may take one of two forms:
372 (1) If it is just a host name, the appropriate global option (mysql_servers
373 or pgsql_servers) is searched for a host of the same name, and the
374 remaining parameters (database, user, password) are taken from there.
376 (2) If it contains any slashes, it is taken as a complete parameter set.
378 The list of servers is used in exactly the same was as the global list.
379 Once a connection to a server has happened and a query has been
380 successfully executed, processing of the lookup ceases.
382 This feature is intended for use in master/slave situations where updates
383 are occurring, and one wants to update a master rather than a slave. If the
384 masters are in the list for reading, you might have:
386 mysql_servers = slave1/db/name/pw:slave2/db/name/pw:master/db/name/pw
388 In an updating lookup, you could then write
390 ${lookup mysql{servers=master; UPDATE ...}
392 If, on the other hand, the master is not to be used for reading lookups:
394 pgsql_servers = slave1/db/name/pw:slave2/db/name/pw
396 you can still update the master by
398 ${lookup pgsql{servers=master/db/name/pw; UPDATE ...}
400 11. The message_body_newlines option (default FALSE, for backwards
401 compatibility) can be used to control whether newlines are present in
402 $message_body and $message_body_end. If it is FALSE, they are replaced by
409 1. There is a new log selector called smtp_no_mail, which is not included in
410 the default setting. When it is set, a line is written to the main log
411 whenever an accepted SMTP connection terminates without having issued a
414 2. When an item in a dnslists list is followed by = and & and a list of IP
415 addresses, the behaviour was not clear when the lookup returned more than
416 one IP address. This has been solved by the addition of == and =& for "all"
417 rather than the default "any" matching.
419 3. Up till now, the only control over which cipher suites GnuTLS uses has been
420 for the cipher algorithms. New options have been added to allow some of the
421 other parameters to be varied.
423 4. There is a new compile-time option called ENABLE_DISABLE_FSYNC. When it is
424 set, Exim compiles a runtime option called disable_fsync.
426 5. There is a new variable called $smtp_count_at_connection_start.
428 6. There's a new control called no_pipelining.
430 7. There are two new variables called $sending_ip_address and $sending_port.
431 These are set whenever an SMTP connection to another host has been set up.
433 8. The expansion of the helo_data option in the smtp transport now happens
434 after the connection to the server has been made.
436 9. There is a new expansion operator ${rfc2047d: that decodes strings that
437 are encoded as per RFC 2047.
439 10. There is a new log selector called "pid", which causes the current process
440 id to be added to every log line, in square brackets, immediately after the
443 11. Exim has been modified so that it flushes SMTP output before implementing
444 a delay in an ACL. It also flushes the output before performing a callout,
445 as this can take a substantial time. These behaviours can be disabled by
446 obeying control = no_delay_flush or control = no_callout_flush,
447 respectively, at some earlier stage of the connection.
449 12. There are two new expansion conditions that iterate over a list. They are
450 called forany and forall.
452 13. There's a new global option called dsn_from that can be used to vary the
453 contents of From: lines in bounces and other automatically generated
454 messages ("delivery status notifications" - hence the name of the option).
456 14. The smtp transport has a new option called hosts_avoid_pipelining.
458 15. By default, exigrep does case-insensitive matches. There is now a -I option
459 that makes it case-sensitive.
461 16. A number of new features ("addresses", "map", "filter", and "reduce") have
462 been added to string expansions to make it easier to process lists of
463 items, typically addresses.
465 17. There's a new ACL modifier called "continue". It does nothing of itself,
466 and processing of the ACL always continues with the next condition or
467 modifier. It is provided so that the side effects of expanding its argument
470 18. It is now possible to use newline and other control characters (those with
471 values less than 32, plus DEL) as separators in lists.
473 19. The exigrep utility now has a -v option, which inverts the matching
476 20. The host_find_failed option in the manualroute router can now be set to
483 No new features were added to 4.66.
489 No new features were added to 4.65.
495 1. ACL variables can now be given arbitrary names, as long as they start with
496 "acl_c" or "acl_m" (for connection variables and message variables), are at
497 least six characters long, with the sixth character being either a digit or
500 2. There is a new ACL modifier called log_reject_target. It makes it possible
501 to specify which logs are used for messages about ACL rejections.
503 3. There is a new authenticator called "dovecot". This is an interface to the
504 authentication facility of the Dovecot POP/IMAP server, which can support a
505 number of authentication methods.
507 4. The variable $message_headers_raw provides a concatenation of all the
508 messages's headers without any decoding. This is in contrast to
509 $message_headers, which does RFC2047 decoding on the header contents.
511 5. In a DNS black list, if two domain names, comma-separated, are given, the
512 second is used first to do an initial check, making use of any IP value
513 restrictions that are set. If there is a match, the first domain is used,
514 without any IP value restrictions, to get the TXT record.
516 6. All authenticators now have a server_condition option.
518 7. There is a new command-line option called -Mset. It is useful only in
519 conjunction with -be (that is, when testing string expansions). It must be
520 followed by a message id; Exim loads the given message from its spool
521 before doing the expansions.
523 8. Another similar new command-line option is called -bem. It operates like
524 -be except that it must be followed by the name of a file that contains a
527 9. When an address is delayed because of a 4xx response to a RCPT command, it
528 is now the combination of sender and recipient that is delayed in
529 subsequent queue runs until its retry time is reached.
531 10. Unary negation and the bitwise logical operators and, or, xor, not, and
532 shift, have been added to the eval: and eval10: expansion items.
534 11. The variables $interface_address and $interface_port have been renamed
535 as $received_ip_address and $received_port, to make it clear that they
536 relate to message reception rather than delivery. (The old names remain
537 available for compatibility.)
539 12. The "message" modifier can now be used on "accept" and "discard" acl verbs
540 to vary the message that is sent when an SMTP command is accepted.
546 1. There is a new Boolean option called filter_prepend_home for the redirect
549 2. There is a new acl, set by acl_not_smtp_start, which is run right at the
550 start of receiving a non-SMTP message, before any of the message has been
553 3. When an SMTP error message is specified in a "message" modifier in an ACL,
554 or in a :fail: or :defer: message in a redirect router, Exim now checks the
555 start of the message for an SMTP error code.
557 4. There is a new parameter for LDAP lookups called "referrals", which takes
558 one of the settings "follow" (the default) or "nofollow".
560 5. Version 20070721.2 of exipick now included, offering these new options:
562 After all other sorting options have bee processed, reverse order
563 before displaying messages (-R is synonym).
565 Randomize order of matching messages before displaying.
567 Instead of displaying the matching messages, display the sum
569 --sort <variable>[,<variable>...]
570 Before displaying matching messages, sort the messages according to
571 each messages value for each variable.
573 Negate the value for every test (returns inverse output from the
574 same criteria without --not).
580 1. The ${readsocket expansion item now supports Internet domain sockets as well
581 as Unix domain sockets. If the first argument begins "inet:", it must be of
582 the form "inet:host:port". The port is mandatory; it may be a number or the
583 name of a TCP port in /etc/services. The host may be a name, or it may be an
584 IP address. An ip address may optionally be enclosed in square brackets.
585 This is best for IPv6 addresses. For example:
587 ${readsocket{inet:[::1]:1234}{<request data>}...
589 Only a single host name may be given, but if looking it up yield more than
590 one IP address, they are each tried in turn until a connection is made. Once
591 a connection has been made, the behaviour is as for ${readsocket with a Unix
594 2. If a redirect router sets up file or pipe deliveries for more than one
595 incoming address, and the relevant transport has batch_max set greater than
596 one, a batch delivery now occurs.
598 3. The appendfile transport has a new option called maildirfolder_create_regex.
599 Its value is a regular expression. For a maildir delivery, this is matched
600 against the maildir directory; if it matches, Exim ensures that a
601 maildirfolder file is created alongside the new, cur, and tmp directories.
607 The documentation is up-to-date for the 4.61 release. Major new features since
608 the 4.60 release are:
610 . An option called disable_ipv6, to disable the use of IPv6 completely.
612 . An increase in the number of ACL variables to 20 of each type.
614 . A change to use $auth1, $auth2, and $auth3 in authenticators instead of $1,
615 $2, $3, (though those are still set) because the numeric variables get used
616 for other things in complicated expansions.
618 . The default for rfc1413_query_timeout has been changed from 30s to 5s.
620 . It is possible to use setclassresources() on some BSD OS to control the
621 resources used in pipe deliveries.
623 . A new ACL modifier called add_header, which can be used with any verb.
625 . More errors are detectable in retry rules.
627 There are a number of other additions too.
633 The documentation is up-to-date for the 4.60 release. Major new features since
634 the 4.50 release are:
636 . Support for SQLite.
638 . Support for IGNOREQUOTA in LMTP.
640 . Extensions to the "submission mode" features.
642 . Support for Client SMTP Authorization (CSA).
644 . Support for ratelimiting hosts and users.
646 . New expansion items to help with the BATV "prvs" scheme.
648 . A "match_ip" condition, that matches an IP address against a list.
650 There are many more minor changes.