1 $Cambridge: exim/doc/doc-txt/NewStuff,v 1.176 2010/06/14 18:51:10 pdp Exp $
6 This file contains descriptions of new features that have been added to Exim.
7 Before a formal release, there may be quite a lot of detail so that people can
8 test from the snapshots or the CVS before the documentation is updated. Once
9 the documentation is updated, this file is reduced to a short list.
15 NOTE: this version is not guaranteed backwards-compatible, please read the
18 1. A new main configuration option, "openssl_options", is available if Exim
19 is built with SSL support provided by OpenSSL. The option allows
20 administrators to specify OpenSSL options to be used on connections;
21 typically this is to set bug compatibility features which the OpenSSL
22 developers have not enabled by default. There may be security
23 consequences for certain options, so these should not be changed
26 2. A new pipe transport option, "permit_coredumps", may help with problem
27 diagnosis in some scenarios. Note that Exim is typically installed as
28 a setuid binary, which on most OSes will inhibit coredumps by default,
29 so that safety mechanism would have to be overriden for this option to
30 be able to take effect.
32 3. ClamAV 0.95 is now required for ClamAV support in Exim, unless
33 Local/Makefile sets: WITH_OLD_CLAMAV_STREAM=yes
34 Note that this switches Exim to use a new API ("INSTREAM") and a future
35 release of ClamAV will remove support for the old API ("STREAM").
37 The av_scanner option, when set to "clamd", now takes an optional third
38 part, "local", which causes Exim to pass a filename to ClamAV instead of
39 the file content. This is the same behaviour as when clamd is pointed at
40 a Unix-domain socket. For example:
42 av_scanner = clamd:192.0.2.3 1234:local
44 ClamAV's ExtendedDetectionInfo response format is now handled.
46 4. There is now a -bmalware option, restricted to admin users. This option
47 takes one parameter, a filename, and scans that file with Exim's
48 malware-scanning framework. This is intended purely as a debugging aid
49 to ensure that Exim's scanning is working, not to replace other tools.
50 Note that the ACL framework is not invoked, so if av_scanner references
51 ACL variables without a fallback then this will fail.
53 5. There is a new expansion operator, "reverse_ip", which will reverse IP
54 addresses; IPv4 into dotted quad, IPv6 into dotted nibble. Examples:
56 ${reverse_ip:192.0.2.4}
58 ${reverse_ip:2001:0db8:c42:9:1:abcd:192.0.2.3}
59 -> 3.0.2.0.0.0.0.c.d.c.b.a.1.0.0.0.9.0.0.0.2.4.c.0.8.b.d.0.1.0.0.2
61 6. There is a new ACL control called "debug", to enable debug logging.
62 This allows selective logging of certain incoming transactions within
63 production environments, with some care. It takes two options, "tag"
64 and "opts"; "tag" is included in the filename of the log and "opts"
65 is used as per the -d<options> command-line option. Examples, which
66 don't all make sense in all contexts:
69 control = debug/tag=.$sender_host_address
70 control = debug/opts=+expand+acl
71 control = debug/tag=.$message_exim_id/opts=+expand
73 7. It has always been implicit in the design and the documentation that
74 "the Exim user" is not root. src/EDITME said that using root was
75 "very strongly discouraged". This is not enough to keep people from
76 shooting themselves in the foot in days when many don't configure Exim
77 themselves but via package build managers. The security consequences of
78 running various bits of network code are severe if there should be bugs in
79 them. As such, the Exim user may no longer be root. If configured
80 statically, Exim will refuse to build. If configured as ref:user then Exim
81 will exit shortly after start-up. If you must shoot yourself in the foot,
82 then henceforth you will have to maintain your own local patches to strip
85 8. There is a new expansion operator, bool_lax{}. Where bool{} uses the ACL
86 condition logic to determine truth/failure and will fail to expand many
87 strings, bool_lax{} uses the router condition logic, where most strings
89 Note: bool{00} is false, bool_lax{00} is true.
91 9. Routers now support multiple "condition" tests,
93 10. There is now a runtime configuration option "tcp_wrappers_daemon_name".
94 Setting this allows an admin to define which entry in the tcpwrappers
95 config file will be used to control access to the daemon. This option
96 is only available when Exim is built with USE_TCP_WRAPPERS. The
97 default value is set at build time using the TCP_WRAPPERS_DAEMON_NAME
100 11. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] The default value for system_filter_user is now
101 the Exim run-time user, instead of root.
103 12. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] ALT_CONFIG_ROOT_ONLY is no longer optional and
104 is forced on. This is mitigated by the new build option
105 TRUSTED_CONFIG_LIST which defines a list of configuration files which
106 are trusted; if a config file is owned by root and matches a pathname in
107 the list, then it may be invoked by the Exim build-time user without Exim
108 relinquishing root privileges.
110 13. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] The Exim user is no longer automatically
111 trusted to supply -D<Macro[=Value]> overrides on the command-line. Going
112 forward, we recommend using TRUSTED_CONFIG_LIST with shim configs that
113 include the main config. As a transition mechanism, we are temporarily
114 providing a work-around: the new build option WHITELIST_D_MACROS provides
115 a colon-separated list of macro names which may be overriden by the Exim
116 run-time user. The values of these macros are constrained to the regex
117 ^[A-Za-z0-9_/.-]*$ (which explicitly does allow for empty values).
123 1. TWO SECURITY FIXES: one relating to mail-spools which are globally
124 writable, the other to locking of MBX folders (not mbox).
126 2. MySQL stored procedures are now supported.
128 3. The dkim_domain transport option is now a list, not a single string, and
129 messages will be signed for each element in the list (discarding
132 4. The 4.70 release unexpectedly changed the behaviour of dnsdb TXT lookups
133 in the presence of multiple character strings within the RR. Prior to 4.70,
134 only the first string would be returned. The dnsdb lookup now, by default,
135 preserves the pre-4.70 semantics, but also now takes an extended output
136 separator specification. The separator can be followed by a semicolon, to
137 concatenate the individual text strings together with no join character,
138 or by a comma and a second separator character, in which case the text
139 strings within a TXT record are joined on that second character.
140 Administrators are reminded that DNS provides no ordering guarantees
141 between multiple records in an RRset. For example:
143 foo.example. IN TXT "a" "b" "c"
144 foo.example. IN TXT "d" "e" "f"
146 ${lookup dnsdb{>/ txt=foo.example}} -> "a/d"
147 ${lookup dnsdb{>/; txt=foo.example}} -> "def/abc"
148 ${lookup dnsdb{>/,+ txt=foo.example}} -> "a+b+c/d+e+f"
154 1. Native DKIM support without an external library.
155 (Note that if no action to prevent it is taken, a straight upgrade will
156 result in DKIM verification of all signed incoming emails. See spec
157 for details on conditionally disabling)
159 2. Experimental DCC support via dccifd (contributed by Wolfgang Breyha).
161 3. There is now a bool{} expansion condition which maps certain strings to
162 true/false condition values (most likely of use in conjunction with the
163 and{} expansion operator).
165 4. The $spam_score, $spam_bar and $spam_report variables are now available
168 5. exim -bP now supports "macros", "macro_list" or "macro MACRO_NAME" as
169 options, provided that Exim is invoked by an admin_user.
171 6. There is a new option gnutls_compat_mode, when linked against GnuTLS,
172 which increases compatibility with older clients at the cost of decreased
173 security. Don't set this unless you need to support such clients.
175 7. There is a new expansion operator, ${randint:...} which will produce a
176 "random" number less than the supplied integer. This randomness is
177 not guaranteed to be cryptographically strong, but depending upon how
178 Exim was built may be better than the most naive schemes.
180 8. Exim now explicitly ensures that SHA256 is available when linked against
183 9. The transport_filter_timeout option now applies to SMTP transports too.
189 1. Preliminary DKIM support in Experimental.
195 1. The body_linecount and body_zerocount C variables are now exported in the
198 2. When a dnslists lookup succeeds, the key that was looked up is now placed
199 in $dnslist_matched. When the key is an IP address, it is not reversed in
200 this variable (though it is, of course, in the actual lookup). In simple
203 deny dnslists = spamhaus.example
205 the key is also available in another variable (in this case,
206 $sender_host_address). In more complicated cases, however, this is not
207 true. For example, using a data lookup might generate a dnslists lookup
210 deny dnslists = spamhaus.example/<|192.168.1.2|192.168.6.7|...
212 If this condition succeeds, the value in $dnslist_matched might be
213 192.168.6.7 (for example).
215 3. Authenticators now have a client_condition option. When Exim is running as
216 a client, it skips an authenticator whose client_condition expansion yields
217 "0", "no", or "false". This can be used, for example, to skip plain text
218 authenticators when the connection is not encrypted by a setting such as:
220 client_condition = ${if !eq{$tls_cipher}{}}
222 Note that the 4.67 documentation states that $tls_cipher contains the
223 cipher used for incoming messages. In fact, during SMTP delivery, it
224 contains the cipher used for the delivery. The same is true for
227 4. There is now a -Mvc <message-id> option, which outputs a copy of the
228 message to the standard output, in RFC 2822 format. The option can be used
229 only by an admin user.
231 5. There is now a /noupdate option for the ratelimit ACL condition. It
232 computes the rate and checks the limit as normal, but it does not update
233 the saved data. This means that, in relevant ACLs, it is possible to lookup
234 the existence of a specified (or auto-generated) ratelimit key without
235 incrementing the ratelimit counter for that key.
237 In order for this to be useful, another ACL entry must set the rate
238 for the same key somewhere (otherwise it will always be zero).
243 # Read the rate; if it doesn't exist or is below the maximum
245 deny ratelimit = 100 / 5m / strict / noupdate
246 log_message = RATE: $sender_rate / $sender_rate_period \
247 (max $sender_rate_limit)
249 [... some other logic and tests...]
251 warn ratelimit = 100 / 5m / strict / per_cmd
252 log_message = RATE UPDATE: $sender_rate / $sender_rate_period \
253 (max $sender_rate_limit)
254 condition = ${if le{$sender_rate}{$sender_rate_limit}}
258 6. The variable $max_received_linelength contains the number of bytes in the
259 longest line that was received as part of the message, not counting the
260 line termination character(s).
262 7. Host lists can now include +ignore_defer and +include_defer, analagous to
263 +ignore_unknown and +include_unknown. These options should be used with
264 care, probably only in non-critical host lists such as whitelists.
266 8. There's a new option called queue_only_load_latch, which defaults true.
267 If set false when queue_only_load is greater than zero, Exim re-evaluates
268 the load for each incoming message in an SMTP session. Otherwise, once one
269 message is queued, the remainder are also.
271 9. There is a new ACL, specified by acl_smtp_notquit, which is run in most
272 cases when an SMTP session ends without sending QUIT. However, when Exim
273 itself is is bad trouble, such as being unable to write to its log files,
274 this ACL is not run, because it might try to do things (such as write to
275 log files) that make the situation even worse.
277 Like the QUIT ACL, this new ACL is provided to make it possible to gather
278 statistics. Whatever it returns (accept or deny) is immaterial. The "delay"
279 modifier is forbidden in this ACL.
281 When the NOTQUIT ACL is running, the variable $smtp_notquit_reason is set
282 to a string that indicates the reason for the termination of the SMTP
283 connection. The possible values are:
285 acl-drop Another ACL issued a "drop" command
286 bad-commands Too many unknown or non-mail commands
287 command-timeout Timeout while reading SMTP commands
288 connection-lost The SMTP connection has been lost
289 data-timeout Timeout while reading message data
290 local-scan-error The local_scan() function crashed
291 local-scan-timeout The local_scan() function timed out
292 signal-exit SIGTERM or SIGINT
293 synchronization-error SMTP synchronization error
294 tls-failed TLS failed to start
296 In most cases when an SMTP connection is closed without having received
297 QUIT, Exim sends an SMTP response message before actually closing the
298 connection. With the exception of acl-drop, the default message can be
299 overridden by the "message" modifier in the NOTQUIT ACL. In the case of a
300 "drop" verb in another ACL, it is the message from the other ACL that is
303 10. For MySQL and PostgreSQL lookups, it is now possible to specify a list of
304 servers with individual queries. This is done by starting the query with
305 "servers=x:y:z;", where each item in the list may take one of two forms:
307 (1) If it is just a host name, the appropriate global option (mysql_servers
308 or pgsql_servers) is searched for a host of the same name, and the
309 remaining parameters (database, user, password) are taken from there.
311 (2) If it contains any slashes, it is taken as a complete parameter set.
313 The list of servers is used in exactly the same was as the global list.
314 Once a connection to a server has happened and a query has been
315 successfully executed, processing of the lookup ceases.
317 This feature is intended for use in master/slave situations where updates
318 are occurring, and one wants to update a master rather than a slave. If the
319 masters are in the list for reading, you might have:
321 mysql_servers = slave1/db/name/pw:slave2/db/name/pw:master/db/name/pw
323 In an updating lookup, you could then write
325 ${lookup mysql{servers=master; UPDATE ...}
327 If, on the other hand, the master is not to be used for reading lookups:
329 pgsql_servers = slave1/db/name/pw:slave2/db/name/pw
331 you can still update the master by
333 ${lookup pgsql{servers=master/db/name/pw; UPDATE ...}
335 11. The message_body_newlines option (default FALSE, for backwards
336 compatibility) can be used to control whether newlines are present in
337 $message_body and $message_body_end. If it is FALSE, they are replaced by
344 1. There is a new log selector called smtp_no_mail, which is not included in
345 the default setting. When it is set, a line is written to the main log
346 whenever an accepted SMTP connection terminates without having issued a
349 2. When an item in a dnslists list is followed by = and & and a list of IP
350 addresses, the behaviour was not clear when the lookup returned more than
351 one IP address. This has been solved by the addition of == and =& for "all"
352 rather than the default "any" matching.
354 3. Up till now, the only control over which cipher suites GnuTLS uses has been
355 for the cipher algorithms. New options have been added to allow some of the
356 other parameters to be varied.
358 4. There is a new compile-time option called ENABLE_DISABLE_FSYNC. When it is
359 set, Exim compiles a runtime option called disable_fsync.
361 5. There is a new variable called $smtp_count_at_connection_start.
363 6. There's a new control called no_pipelining.
365 7. There are two new variables called $sending_ip_address and $sending_port.
366 These are set whenever an SMTP connection to another host has been set up.
368 8. The expansion of the helo_data option in the smtp transport now happens
369 after the connection to the server has been made.
371 9. There is a new expansion operator ${rfc2047d: that decodes strings that
372 are encoded as per RFC 2047.
374 10. There is a new log selector called "pid", which causes the current process
375 id to be added to every log line, in square brackets, immediately after the
378 11. Exim has been modified so that it flushes SMTP output before implementing
379 a delay in an ACL. It also flushes the output before performing a callout,
380 as this can take a substantial time. These behaviours can be disabled by
381 obeying control = no_delay_flush or control = no_callout_flush,
382 respectively, at some earlier stage of the connection.
384 12. There are two new expansion conditions that iterate over a list. They are
385 called forany and forall.
387 13. There's a new global option called dsn_from that can be used to vary the
388 contents of From: lines in bounces and other automatically generated
389 messages ("delivery status notifications" - hence the name of the option).
391 14. The smtp transport has a new option called hosts_avoid_pipelining.
393 15. By default, exigrep does case-insensitive matches. There is now a -I option
394 that makes it case-sensitive.
396 16. A number of new features ("addresses", "map", "filter", and "reduce") have
397 been added to string expansions to make it easier to process lists of
398 items, typically addresses.
400 17. There's a new ACL modifier called "continue". It does nothing of itself,
401 and processing of the ACL always continues with the next condition or
402 modifier. It is provided so that the side effects of expanding its argument
405 18. It is now possible to use newline and other control characters (those with
406 values less than 32, plus DEL) as separators in lists.
408 19. The exigrep utility now has a -v option, which inverts the matching
411 20. The host_find_failed option in the manualroute router can now be set to
418 No new features were added to 4.66.
424 No new features were added to 4.65.
430 1. ACL variables can now be given arbitrary names, as long as they start with
431 "acl_c" or "acl_m" (for connection variables and message variables), are at
432 least six characters long, with the sixth character being either a digit or
435 2. There is a new ACL modifier called log_reject_target. It makes it possible
436 to specify which logs are used for messages about ACL rejections.
438 3. There is a new authenticator called "dovecot". This is an interface to the
439 authentication facility of the Dovecot POP/IMAP server, which can support a
440 number of authentication methods.
442 4. The variable $message_headers_raw provides a concatenation of all the
443 messages's headers without any decoding. This is in contrast to
444 $message_headers, which does RFC2047 decoding on the header contents.
446 5. In a DNS black list, if two domain names, comma-separated, are given, the
447 second is used first to do an initial check, making use of any IP value
448 restrictions that are set. If there is a match, the first domain is used,
449 without any IP value restrictions, to get the TXT record.
451 6. All authenticators now have a server_condition option.
453 7. There is a new command-line option called -Mset. It is useful only in
454 conjunction with -be (that is, when testing string expansions). It must be
455 followed by a message id; Exim loads the given message from its spool
456 before doing the expansions.
458 8. Another similar new command-line option is called -bem. It operates like
459 -be except that it must be followed by the name of a file that contains a
462 9. When an address is delayed because of a 4xx response to a RCPT command, it
463 is now the combination of sender and recipient that is delayed in
464 subsequent queue runs until its retry time is reached.
466 10. Unary negation and the bitwise logical operators and, or, xor, not, and
467 shift, have been added to the eval: and eval10: expansion items.
469 11. The variables $interface_address and $interface_port have been renamed
470 as $received_ip_address and $received_port, to make it clear that they
471 relate to message reception rather than delivery. (The old names remain
472 available for compatibility.)
474 12. The "message" modifier can now be used on "accept" and "discard" acl verbs
475 to vary the message that is sent when an SMTP command is accepted.
481 1. There is a new Boolean option called filter_prepend_home for the redirect
484 2. There is a new acl, set by acl_not_smtp_start, which is run right at the
485 start of receiving a non-SMTP message, before any of the message has been
488 3. When an SMTP error message is specified in a "message" modifier in an ACL,
489 or in a :fail: or :defer: message in a redirect router, Exim now checks the
490 start of the message for an SMTP error code.
492 4. There is a new parameter for LDAP lookups called "referrals", which takes
493 one of the settings "follow" (the default) or "nofollow".
495 5. Version 20070721.2 of exipick now included, offering these new options:
497 After all other sorting options have bee processed, reverse order
498 before displaying messages (-R is synonym).
500 Randomize order of matching messages before displaying.
502 Instead of displaying the matching messages, display the sum
504 --sort <variable>[,<variable>...]
505 Before displaying matching messages, sort the messages according to
506 each messages value for each variable.
508 Negate the value for every test (returns inverse output from the
509 same criteria without --not).
515 1. The ${readsocket expansion item now supports Internet domain sockets as well
516 as Unix domain sockets. If the first argument begins "inet:", it must be of
517 the form "inet:host:port". The port is mandatory; it may be a number or the
518 name of a TCP port in /etc/services. The host may be a name, or it may be an
519 IP address. An ip address may optionally be enclosed in square brackets.
520 This is best for IPv6 addresses. For example:
522 ${readsocket{inet:[::1]:1234}{<request data>}...
524 Only a single host name may be given, but if looking it up yield more than
525 one IP address, they are each tried in turn until a connection is made. Once
526 a connection has been made, the behaviour is as for ${readsocket with a Unix
529 2. If a redirect router sets up file or pipe deliveries for more than one
530 incoming address, and the relevant transport has batch_max set greater than
531 one, a batch delivery now occurs.
533 3. The appendfile transport has a new option called maildirfolder_create_regex.
534 Its value is a regular expression. For a maildir delivery, this is matched
535 against the maildir directory; if it matches, Exim ensures that a
536 maildirfolder file is created alongside the new, cur, and tmp directories.
542 The documentation is up-to-date for the 4.61 release. Major new features since
543 the 4.60 release are:
545 . An option called disable_ipv6, to disable the use of IPv6 completely.
547 . An increase in the number of ACL variables to 20 of each type.
549 . A change to use $auth1, $auth2, and $auth3 in authenticators instead of $1,
550 $2, $3, (though those are still set) because the numeric variables get used
551 for other things in complicated expansions.
553 . The default for rfc1413_query_timeout has been changed from 30s to 5s.
555 . It is possible to use setclassresources() on some BSD OS to control the
556 resources used in pipe deliveries.
558 . A new ACL modifier called add_header, which can be used with any verb.
560 . More errors are detectable in retry rules.
562 There are a number of other additions too.
568 The documentation is up-to-date for the 4.60 release. Major new features since
569 the 4.50 release are:
571 . Support for SQLite.
573 . Support for IGNOREQUOTA in LMTP.
575 . Extensions to the "submission mode" features.
577 . Support for Client SMTP Authorization (CSA).
579 . Support for ratelimiting hosts and users.
581 . New expansion items to help with the BATV "prvs" scheme.
583 . A "match_ip" condition, that matches an IP address against a list.
585 There are many more minor changes.