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 authenticator driver, "gsasl". Server-only (at present).
13 This is a SASL interface, licensed under GPL, which can be found at
14 http://www.gnu.org/software/gsasl/.
15 This system does not provide sources of data for authentication, so
16 careful use needs to be made of the conditions in Exim. Note that
17 this can not yet be used as a drop-in replacement for Cyrus SASL, as
18 Exim is currently unable to construct strings with embedded NULs for
19 use as keys in lookups against sasldb2.
25 1. New options for the ratelimit ACL condition: /count= and /unique=.
26 The /noupdate option has been replaced by a /readonly option.
28 2. The SMTP transport's protocol option may now be set to "smtps", to
29 use SSL-on-connect outbound.
31 3. New variable $av_failed, set true if the AV scanner deferred; ie, when
32 there is a problem talking to the AV scanner, or the AV scanner running.
34 4. New expansion conditions, "inlist" and "inlisti", which take simple lists
35 and check if the search item is a member of the list. This does not
36 support named lists, but does subject the list part to string expansion.
38 5. Unless the new EXPAND_LISTMATCH_RHS build option is set when Exim was
39 built, Exim no longer performs string expansion on the second string of
40 the match_* expansion conditions: "match_address", "match_domain",
41 "match_ip" & "match_local_part". Named lists can still be used.
47 1. The global option "dns_use_edns0" may be set to coerce EDNS0 usage on
48 or off in the resolver library.
54 1. In addition to the existing LDAP and LDAP/SSL ("ldaps") support, there
55 is now LDAP/TLS support, given sufficiently modern OpenLDAP client
56 libraries. The following global options have been added in support of
57 this: ldap_ca_cert_dir, ldap_ca_cert_file, ldap_cert_file, ldap_cert_key,
58 ldap_cipher_suite, ldap_require_cert, ldap_start_tls.
60 2. The pipe transport now takes a boolean option, "freeze_signal", default
61 false. When true, if the external delivery command exits on a signal then
62 Exim will freeze the message in the queue, instead of generating a bounce.
64 3. Log filenames may now use %M as an escape, instead of %D (still available).
65 The %M pattern expands to yyyymm, providing month-level resolution.
67 4. The $message_linecount variable is now updated for the maildir_tag option,
68 in the same way as $message_size, to reflect the real number of lines,
69 including any header additions or removals from transport.
71 5. When contacting a pool of SpamAssassin servers configured in spamd_address,
72 Exim now selects entries randomly, to better scale in a cluster setup.
78 1. SECURITY FIX: privilege escalation flaw fixed. On Linux (and only Linux)
79 the flaw permitted the Exim run-time user to cause root to append to
80 arbitrary files of the attacker's choosing, with the content based
81 on content supplied by the attacker.
83 2. Exim now supports loading some lookup types at run-time, using your
84 platform's dlopen() functionality. This has limited platform support
85 and the intention is not to support every variant, it's limited to
86 dlopen(). This permits the main Exim binary to not be linked against
87 all the libraries needed for all the lookup types.
93 NOTE: this version is not guaranteed backwards-compatible, please read the
96 1. A new main configuration option, "openssl_options", is available if Exim
97 is built with SSL support provided by OpenSSL. The option allows
98 administrators to specify OpenSSL options to be used on connections;
99 typically this is to set bug compatibility features which the OpenSSL
100 developers have not enabled by default. There may be security
101 consequences for certain options, so these should not be changed
104 2. A new pipe transport option, "permit_coredumps", may help with problem
105 diagnosis in some scenarios. Note that Exim is typically installed as
106 a setuid binary, which on most OSes will inhibit coredumps by default,
107 so that safety mechanism would have to be overridden for this option to
108 be able to take effect.
110 3. ClamAV 0.95 is now required for ClamAV support in Exim, unless
111 Local/Makefile sets: WITH_OLD_CLAMAV_STREAM=yes
112 Note that this switches Exim to use a new API ("INSTREAM") and a future
113 release of ClamAV will remove support for the old API ("STREAM").
115 The av_scanner option, when set to "clamd", now takes an optional third
116 part, "local", which causes Exim to pass a filename to ClamAV instead of
117 the file content. This is the same behaviour as when clamd is pointed at
118 a Unix-domain socket. For example:
120 av_scanner = clamd:192.0.2.3 1234:local
122 ClamAV's ExtendedDetectionInfo response format is now handled.
124 4. There is now a -bmalware option, restricted to admin users. This option
125 takes one parameter, a filename, and scans that file with Exim's
126 malware-scanning framework. This is intended purely as a debugging aid
127 to ensure that Exim's scanning is working, not to replace other tools.
128 Note that the ACL framework is not invoked, so if av_scanner references
129 ACL variables without a fallback then this will fail.
131 5. There is a new expansion operator, "reverse_ip", which will reverse IP
132 addresses; IPv4 into dotted quad, IPv6 into dotted nibble. Examples:
134 ${reverse_ip:192.0.2.4}
136 ${reverse_ip:2001:0db8:c42:9:1:abcd:192.0.2.3}
137 -> 3.0.2.0.0.0.0.c.d.c.b.a.1.0.0.0.9.0.0.0.2.4.c.0.8.b.d.0.1.0.0.2
139 6. There is a new ACL control called "debug", to enable debug logging.
140 This allows selective logging of certain incoming transactions within
141 production environments, with some care. It takes two options, "tag"
142 and "opts"; "tag" is included in the filename of the log and "opts"
143 is used as per the -d<options> command-line option. Examples, which
144 don't all make sense in all contexts:
147 control = debug/tag=.$sender_host_address
148 control = debug/opts=+expand+acl
149 control = debug/tag=.$message_exim_id/opts=+expand
151 7. It has always been implicit in the design and the documentation that
152 "the Exim user" is not root. src/EDITME said that using root was
153 "very strongly discouraged". This is not enough to keep people from
154 shooting themselves in the foot in days when many don't configure Exim
155 themselves but via package build managers. The security consequences of
156 running various bits of network code are severe if there should be bugs in
157 them. As such, the Exim user may no longer be root. If configured
158 statically, Exim will refuse to build. If configured as ref:user then Exim
159 will exit shortly after start-up. If you must shoot yourself in the foot,
160 then henceforth you will have to maintain your own local patches to strip
163 8. There is a new expansion operator, bool_lax{}. Where bool{} uses the ACL
164 condition logic to determine truth/failure and will fail to expand many
165 strings, bool_lax{} uses the router condition logic, where most strings
167 Note: bool{00} is false, bool_lax{00} is true.
169 9. Routers now support multiple "condition" tests,
171 10. There is now a runtime configuration option "tcp_wrappers_daemon_name".
172 Setting this allows an admin to define which entry in the tcpwrappers
173 config file will be used to control access to the daemon. This option
174 is only available when Exim is built with USE_TCP_WRAPPERS. The
175 default value is set at build time using the TCP_WRAPPERS_DAEMON_NAME
178 11. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] The default value for system_filter_user is now
179 the Exim run-time user, instead of root.
181 12. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] ALT_CONFIG_ROOT_ONLY is no longer optional and
182 is forced on. This is mitigated by the new build option
183 TRUSTED_CONFIG_LIST which defines a list of configuration files which
184 are trusted; one per line. If a config file is owned by root and matches
185 a pathname in the list, then it may be invoked by the Exim build-time
186 user without Exim relinquishing root privileges.
188 13. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] The Exim user is no longer automatically
189 trusted to supply -D<Macro[=Value]> overrides on the command-line. Going
190 forward, we recommend using TRUSTED_CONFIG_LIST with shim configs that
191 include the main config. As a transition mechanism, we are temporarily
192 providing a work-around: the new build option WHITELIST_D_MACROS provides
193 a colon-separated list of macro names which may be overridden by the Exim
194 run-time user. The values of these macros are constrained to the regex
195 ^[A-Za-z0-9_/.-]*$ (which explicitly does allow for empty values).
201 1. TWO SECURITY FIXES: one relating to mail-spools which are globally
202 writable, the other to locking of MBX folders (not mbox).
204 2. MySQL stored procedures are now supported.
206 3. The dkim_domain transport option is now a list, not a single string, and
207 messages will be signed for each element in the list (discarding
210 4. The 4.70 release unexpectedly changed the behaviour of dnsdb TXT lookups
211 in the presence of multiple character strings within the RR. Prior to 4.70,
212 only the first string would be returned. The dnsdb lookup now, by default,
213 preserves the pre-4.70 semantics, but also now takes an extended output
214 separator specification. The separator can be followed by a semicolon, to
215 concatenate the individual text strings together with no join character,
216 or by a comma and a second separator character, in which case the text
217 strings within a TXT record are joined on that second character.
218 Administrators are reminded that DNS provides no ordering guarantees
219 between multiple records in an RRset. For example:
221 foo.example. IN TXT "a" "b" "c"
222 foo.example. IN TXT "d" "e" "f"
224 ${lookup dnsdb{>/ txt=foo.example}} -> "a/d"
225 ${lookup dnsdb{>/; txt=foo.example}} -> "def/abc"
226 ${lookup dnsdb{>/,+ txt=foo.example}} -> "a+b+c/d+e+f"
232 1. Native DKIM support without an external library.
233 (Note that if no action to prevent it is taken, a straight upgrade will
234 result in DKIM verification of all signed incoming emails. See spec
235 for details on conditionally disabling)
237 2. Experimental DCC support via dccifd (contributed by Wolfgang Breyha).
239 3. There is now a bool{} expansion condition which maps certain strings to
240 true/false condition values (most likely of use in conjunction with the
241 and{} expansion operator).
243 4. The $spam_score, $spam_bar and $spam_report variables are now available
246 5. exim -bP now supports "macros", "macro_list" or "macro MACRO_NAME" as
247 options, provided that Exim is invoked by an admin_user.
249 6. There is a new option gnutls_compat_mode, when linked against GnuTLS,
250 which increases compatibility with older clients at the cost of decreased
251 security. Don't set this unless you need to support such clients.
253 7. There is a new expansion operator, ${randint:...} which will produce a
254 "random" number less than the supplied integer. This randomness is
255 not guaranteed to be cryptographically strong, but depending upon how
256 Exim was built may be better than the most naive schemes.
258 8. Exim now explicitly ensures that SHA256 is available when linked against
261 9. The transport_filter_timeout option now applies to SMTP transports too.
267 1. Preliminary DKIM support in Experimental.
273 1. The body_linecount and body_zerocount C variables are now exported in the
276 2. When a dnslists lookup succeeds, the key that was looked up is now placed
277 in $dnslist_matched. When the key is an IP address, it is not reversed in
278 this variable (though it is, of course, in the actual lookup). In simple
281 deny dnslists = spamhaus.example
283 the key is also available in another variable (in this case,
284 $sender_host_address). In more complicated cases, however, this is not
285 true. For example, using a data lookup might generate a dnslists lookup
288 deny dnslists = spamhaus.example/<|192.168.1.2|192.168.6.7|...
290 If this condition succeeds, the value in $dnslist_matched might be
291 192.168.6.7 (for example).
293 3. Authenticators now have a client_condition option. When Exim is running as
294 a client, it skips an authenticator whose client_condition expansion yields
295 "0", "no", or "false". This can be used, for example, to skip plain text
296 authenticators when the connection is not encrypted by a setting such as:
298 client_condition = ${if !eq{$tls_cipher}{}}
300 Note that the 4.67 documentation states that $tls_cipher contains the
301 cipher used for incoming messages. In fact, during SMTP delivery, it
302 contains the cipher used for the delivery. The same is true for
305 4. There is now a -Mvc <message-id> option, which outputs a copy of the
306 message to the standard output, in RFC 2822 format. The option can be used
307 only by an admin user.
309 5. There is now a /noupdate option for the ratelimit ACL condition. It
310 computes the rate and checks the limit as normal, but it does not update
311 the saved data. This means that, in relevant ACLs, it is possible to lookup
312 the existence of a specified (or auto-generated) ratelimit key without
313 incrementing the ratelimit counter for that key.
315 In order for this to be useful, another ACL entry must set the rate
316 for the same key somewhere (otherwise it will always be zero).
321 # Read the rate; if it doesn't exist or is below the maximum
323 deny ratelimit = 100 / 5m / strict / noupdate
324 log_message = RATE: $sender_rate / $sender_rate_period \
325 (max $sender_rate_limit)
327 [... some other logic and tests...]
329 warn ratelimit = 100 / 5m / strict / per_cmd
330 log_message = RATE UPDATE: $sender_rate / $sender_rate_period \
331 (max $sender_rate_limit)
332 condition = ${if le{$sender_rate}{$sender_rate_limit}}
336 6. The variable $max_received_linelength contains the number of bytes in the
337 longest line that was received as part of the message, not counting the
338 line termination character(s).
340 7. Host lists can now include +ignore_defer and +include_defer, analagous to
341 +ignore_unknown and +include_unknown. These options should be used with
342 care, probably only in non-critical host lists such as whitelists.
344 8. There's a new option called queue_only_load_latch, which defaults true.
345 If set false when queue_only_load is greater than zero, Exim re-evaluates
346 the load for each incoming message in an SMTP session. Otherwise, once one
347 message is queued, the remainder are also.
349 9. There is a new ACL, specified by acl_smtp_notquit, which is run in most
350 cases when an SMTP session ends without sending QUIT. However, when Exim
351 itself is is bad trouble, such as being unable to write to its log files,
352 this ACL is not run, because it might try to do things (such as write to
353 log files) that make the situation even worse.
355 Like the QUIT ACL, this new ACL is provided to make it possible to gather
356 statistics. Whatever it returns (accept or deny) is immaterial. The "delay"
357 modifier is forbidden in this ACL.
359 When the NOTQUIT ACL is running, the variable $smtp_notquit_reason is set
360 to a string that indicates the reason for the termination of the SMTP
361 connection. The possible values are:
363 acl-drop Another ACL issued a "drop" command
364 bad-commands Too many unknown or non-mail commands
365 command-timeout Timeout while reading SMTP commands
366 connection-lost The SMTP connection has been lost
367 data-timeout Timeout while reading message data
368 local-scan-error The local_scan() function crashed
369 local-scan-timeout The local_scan() function timed out
370 signal-exit SIGTERM or SIGINT
371 synchronization-error SMTP synchronization error
372 tls-failed TLS failed to start
374 In most cases when an SMTP connection is closed without having received
375 QUIT, Exim sends an SMTP response message before actually closing the
376 connection. With the exception of acl-drop, the default message can be
377 overridden by the "message" modifier in the NOTQUIT ACL. In the case of a
378 "drop" verb in another ACL, it is the message from the other ACL that is
381 10. For MySQL and PostgreSQL lookups, it is now possible to specify a list of
382 servers with individual queries. This is done by starting the query with
383 "servers=x:y:z;", where each item in the list may take one of two forms:
385 (1) If it is just a host name, the appropriate global option (mysql_servers
386 or pgsql_servers) is searched for a host of the same name, and the
387 remaining parameters (database, user, password) are taken from there.
389 (2) If it contains any slashes, it is taken as a complete parameter set.
391 The list of servers is used in exactly the same was as the global list.
392 Once a connection to a server has happened and a query has been
393 successfully executed, processing of the lookup ceases.
395 This feature is intended for use in master/slave situations where updates
396 are occurring, and one wants to update a master rather than a slave. If the
397 masters are in the list for reading, you might have:
399 mysql_servers = slave1/db/name/pw:slave2/db/name/pw:master/db/name/pw
401 In an updating lookup, you could then write
403 ${lookup mysql{servers=master; UPDATE ...}
405 If, on the other hand, the master is not to be used for reading lookups:
407 pgsql_servers = slave1/db/name/pw:slave2/db/name/pw
409 you can still update the master by
411 ${lookup pgsql{servers=master/db/name/pw; UPDATE ...}
413 11. The message_body_newlines option (default FALSE, for backwards
414 compatibility) can be used to control whether newlines are present in
415 $message_body and $message_body_end. If it is FALSE, they are replaced by
422 1. There is a new log selector called smtp_no_mail, which is not included in
423 the default setting. When it is set, a line is written to the main log
424 whenever an accepted SMTP connection terminates without having issued a
427 2. When an item in a dnslists list is followed by = and & and a list of IP
428 addresses, the behaviour was not clear when the lookup returned more than
429 one IP address. This has been solved by the addition of == and =& for "all"
430 rather than the default "any" matching.
432 3. Up till now, the only control over which cipher suites GnuTLS uses has been
433 for the cipher algorithms. New options have been added to allow some of the
434 other parameters to be varied.
436 4. There is a new compile-time option called ENABLE_DISABLE_FSYNC. When it is
437 set, Exim compiles a runtime option called disable_fsync.
439 5. There is a new variable called $smtp_count_at_connection_start.
441 6. There's a new control called no_pipelining.
443 7. There are two new variables called $sending_ip_address and $sending_port.
444 These are set whenever an SMTP connection to another host has been set up.
446 8. The expansion of the helo_data option in the smtp transport now happens
447 after the connection to the server has been made.
449 9. There is a new expansion operator ${rfc2047d: that decodes strings that
450 are encoded as per RFC 2047.
452 10. There is a new log selector called "pid", which causes the current process
453 id to be added to every log line, in square brackets, immediately after the
456 11. Exim has been modified so that it flushes SMTP output before implementing
457 a delay in an ACL. It also flushes the output before performing a callout,
458 as this can take a substantial time. These behaviours can be disabled by
459 obeying control = no_delay_flush or control = no_callout_flush,
460 respectively, at some earlier stage of the connection.
462 12. There are two new expansion conditions that iterate over a list. They are
463 called forany and forall.
465 13. There's a new global option called dsn_from that can be used to vary the
466 contents of From: lines in bounces and other automatically generated
467 messages ("delivery status notifications" - hence the name of the option).
469 14. The smtp transport has a new option called hosts_avoid_pipelining.
471 15. By default, exigrep does case-insensitive matches. There is now a -I option
472 that makes it case-sensitive.
474 16. A number of new features ("addresses", "map", "filter", and "reduce") have
475 been added to string expansions to make it easier to process lists of
476 items, typically addresses.
478 17. There's a new ACL modifier called "continue". It does nothing of itself,
479 and processing of the ACL always continues with the next condition or
480 modifier. It is provided so that the side effects of expanding its argument
483 18. It is now possible to use newline and other control characters (those with
484 values less than 32, plus DEL) as separators in lists.
486 19. The exigrep utility now has a -v option, which inverts the matching
489 20. The host_find_failed option in the manualroute router can now be set to
496 No new features were added to 4.66.
502 No new features were added to 4.65.
508 1. ACL variables can now be given arbitrary names, as long as they start with
509 "acl_c" or "acl_m" (for connection variables and message variables), are at
510 least six characters long, with the sixth character being either a digit or
513 2. There is a new ACL modifier called log_reject_target. It makes it possible
514 to specify which logs are used for messages about ACL rejections.
516 3. There is a new authenticator called "dovecot". This is an interface to the
517 authentication facility of the Dovecot POP/IMAP server, which can support a
518 number of authentication methods.
520 4. The variable $message_headers_raw provides a concatenation of all the
521 messages's headers without any decoding. This is in contrast to
522 $message_headers, which does RFC2047 decoding on the header contents.
524 5. In a DNS black list, if two domain names, comma-separated, are given, the
525 second is used first to do an initial check, making use of any IP value
526 restrictions that are set. If there is a match, the first domain is used,
527 without any IP value restrictions, to get the TXT record.
529 6. All authenticators now have a server_condition option.
531 7. There is a new command-line option called -Mset. It is useful only in
532 conjunction with -be (that is, when testing string expansions). It must be
533 followed by a message id; Exim loads the given message from its spool
534 before doing the expansions.
536 8. Another similar new command-line option is called -bem. It operates like
537 -be except that it must be followed by the name of a file that contains a
540 9. When an address is delayed because of a 4xx response to a RCPT command, it
541 is now the combination of sender and recipient that is delayed in
542 subsequent queue runs until its retry time is reached.
544 10. Unary negation and the bitwise logical operators and, or, xor, not, and
545 shift, have been added to the eval: and eval10: expansion items.
547 11. The variables $interface_address and $interface_port have been renamed
548 as $received_ip_address and $received_port, to make it clear that they
549 relate to message reception rather than delivery. (The old names remain
550 available for compatibility.)
552 12. The "message" modifier can now be used on "accept" and "discard" acl verbs
553 to vary the message that is sent when an SMTP command is accepted.
559 1. There is a new Boolean option called filter_prepend_home for the redirect
562 2. There is a new acl, set by acl_not_smtp_start, which is run right at the
563 start of receiving a non-SMTP message, before any of the message has been
566 3. When an SMTP error message is specified in a "message" modifier in an ACL,
567 or in a :fail: or :defer: message in a redirect router, Exim now checks the
568 start of the message for an SMTP error code.
570 4. There is a new parameter for LDAP lookups called "referrals", which takes
571 one of the settings "follow" (the default) or "nofollow".
573 5. Version 20070721.2 of exipick now included, offering these new options:
575 After all other sorting options have bee processed, reverse order
576 before displaying messages (-R is synonym).
578 Randomize order of matching messages before displaying.
580 Instead of displaying the matching messages, display the sum
582 --sort <variable>[,<variable>...]
583 Before displaying matching messages, sort the messages according to
584 each messages value for each variable.
586 Negate the value for every test (returns inverse output from the
587 same criteria without --not).
593 1. The ${readsocket expansion item now supports Internet domain sockets as well
594 as Unix domain sockets. If the first argument begins "inet:", it must be of
595 the form "inet:host:port". The port is mandatory; it may be a number or the
596 name of a TCP port in /etc/services. The host may be a name, or it may be an
597 IP address. An ip address may optionally be enclosed in square brackets.
598 This is best for IPv6 addresses. For example:
600 ${readsocket{inet:[::1]:1234}{<request data>}...
602 Only a single host name may be given, but if looking it up yield more than
603 one IP address, they are each tried in turn until a connection is made. Once
604 a connection has been made, the behaviour is as for ${readsocket with a Unix
607 2. If a redirect router sets up file or pipe deliveries for more than one
608 incoming address, and the relevant transport has batch_max set greater than
609 one, a batch delivery now occurs.
611 3. The appendfile transport has a new option called maildirfolder_create_regex.
612 Its value is a regular expression. For a maildir delivery, this is matched
613 against the maildir directory; if it matches, Exim ensures that a
614 maildirfolder file is created alongside the new, cur, and tmp directories.
620 The documentation is up-to-date for the 4.61 release. Major new features since
621 the 4.60 release are:
623 . An option called disable_ipv6, to disable the use of IPv6 completely.
625 . An increase in the number of ACL variables to 20 of each type.
627 . A change to use $auth1, $auth2, and $auth3 in authenticators instead of $1,
628 $2, $3, (though those are still set) because the numeric variables get used
629 for other things in complicated expansions.
631 . The default for rfc1413_query_timeout has been changed from 30s to 5s.
633 . It is possible to use setclassresources() on some BSD OS to control the
634 resources used in pipe deliveries.
636 . A new ACL modifier called add_header, which can be used with any verb.
638 . More errors are detectable in retry rules.
640 There are a number of other additions too.
646 The documentation is up-to-date for the 4.60 release. Major new features since
647 the 4.50 release are:
649 . Support for SQLite.
651 . Support for IGNOREQUOTA in LMTP.
653 . Extensions to the "submission mode" features.
655 . Support for Client SMTP Authorization (CSA).
657 . Support for ratelimiting hosts and users.
659 . New expansion items to help with the BATV "prvs" scheme.
661 . A "match_ip" condition, that matches an IP address against a list.
663 There are many more minor changes.