1 EXPORTABLE EXIM TEST SUITE
2 --------------------------
4 This document last updated for:
6 Test Suite Version: 4.67
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 be in the exim group so that
77 it has access to logs, spool files, etc. The login should not be one of the
78 names "userx", "usery", "userz", or a few other simple ones such as "abcd"
79 and "xyz" and single letters that are used in the tests. The test suite
80 expects the login to have a gecos name; I think it will now run if the
81 gecos field is empty but there may be anomalies.
83 (4) The directory into which you unpack the test suite must be accessible by
84 the Exim user, so that code running as exim can access the files therein. A
85 world-readable directory is fine. However, there may be problems if the
86 path name of the directory is excessively long. This is because it
87 sometimes appears in log lines or debug output, and if it is truncated, it
88 is no longer recognized.
90 (5) Exim must be built with its user and group specified at build time, and
91 with certain minimum facilities, namely:
93 Routers: accept, dnslookup, manualroute, redirect
94 Transports: appendfile, autoreply, pipe, smtp
97 Most Exim binaries will have these included.
99 (6) A C compiler is needed to build some test programs, and the test script is
100 written in Perl, so you need that.
102 (7) Some of the tests run Exim as a daemon, and others use a testing server
103 (described below). These require TCP ports. In the configurations and
104 scripts, the ports are parameterized, but at present, fixed values are
105 written into the controlling script. These are ports 1224 to 1229. If these
106 ports are not available for use, some of the tests will fail.
108 (8) There is an underlying assumption that the host on which the tests are
109 being run has an IPv4 address (which the test script seeks out). If there
110 is also an IPv6 address, additional tests are run when the Exim binary
111 contains IPv6 support. There are checks in the scripts for a running IPv4
112 interface; when one is not found, some tests are skipped (with a warning
115 (9) Exim must be built with TRUSTED_CONFIG_LIST support, so that the test
116 configs can be placed into it. DISABLE_D_OPTION must not be used. If
117 ALT_CONFIG_PREFIX is used, it must contain the directory of the test-suite.
118 WHITELIST_D_MACROS should contain:
120 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:LS: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:RT:S:SELECTOR:SELF:SERVER:SERVERS:SREQCIP:SREQMAC:SRV:STD:STRICT:SUB:SUBMISSION_OPTIONS:TIMEOUTDEFER:TIMES:TRUSTED:TRYCLEAR:UL:USE_SENDER:UTF8:VALUE:WMF:X:Y
122 (10) Exim must *not* be built with USE_READLINE, as the test-suite's automation
123 assumes the simpler I/O model.
124 Exim must *not* be built with HEADERS_CHARSET set to UTF-8.
131 If the Exim binary that is being tested contains extra functionality in
132 addition to the minimum specified above, additional tests are run to exercise
133 the extra functionality, except for a few special cases such as the databases
134 (MySQL, PostgreSQL, LDAP) where special data is needed for the tests.
137 RUNNING THE TEST SUITE
138 ----------------------
140 (1) Download the tarball exim-testsuite-x.xx.tar.bz2 and unpack it, preferably
141 in a directory alongside an Exim source directory (see below).
143 (2) cd into the exim-testsuite-x.xx directory.
145 (3) Run "./configure" and then "make". This builds a few auxiliary programs
146 that are written in C.
148 (4) echo $PWD/test-config >> your_TRUSTED_CONFIG_LIST_filename
150 (5) Run "./runtest" (a Perl script) as described below.
152 (6) If you want to see what tests are available, run "./listtests".
155 BREAKING OUT OF THE TEST SCRIPT
156 -------------------------------
158 If you abandon the test run by typing ^C, the interrupt may be passed to a
159 program that the script is running, or it may be passed to the script itself.
160 In the former case, the script should detect that the program has ended
161 abnormally. In both cases, the script tries to clean up everything, including
162 killing any Exim daemons that it has started. However, there may be race
163 conditions in which the clean up does not happen. If, after breaking out of a
164 run, you see strange errors in the next run, look for any left-over Exim
165 daemons, and kill them by hand.
171 The individual test scripts are in subdirectories of the "scripts" directory.
172 If you do not supply any arguments to ./listtests, it scans all the scripts in
173 all the directories, and outputs the heading line from each script. The output
174 is piped through "less", and begins like this:
177 Basic/0001 Basic configuration setting
178 Basic/0002 Common string expansions
179 Basic/0003 Caseless address blocking
182 Lines that start === give the name of the subdirectory containing the test
183 scripts that follow. If you supply an argument to ./listtests, it is used as a
184 Perl pattern to match case-independently against the names of the
185 subdirectories. Only those that match are scanned. For example, "./listtests
188 === 1000-Basic-ipv6 ===
189 === Requires: support IPv6
190 Basic-ipv6/1000 -bh and non-canonical IPv6 addresses
191 Basic-ipv6/1001 recognizing IPv6 address in HELO/EHLO
193 === 2250-dnsdb-ipv6 ===
194 === Requires: support IPv6
196 dnsdb-ipv6/2250 dnsdb ipv6 lookup in string expansions
198 If you supply a second argument to ./listtests, it is used as a Perl pattern to
199 match case-independently against the individual script titles. For example,
200 "./listtests . mx" lists all tests whose titles contain "mx", because "."
201 matches all the subdirectory names.
207 If you do not supply any arguments to ./runtest, it searches for an Exim
208 source tree at the same level as the test suite directory. It then looks for an
209 Exim binary in a "build" directory of that source tree. If there are several
210 Exim source trees, it chooses the latest version of Exim. Consider the
214 exim-4.60/ exim-4.62/ exim-testsuite-x.xx/
216 A simple ./runtest from within the test suite will use a 4.62 binary if it
217 finds one, otherwise a 4.60 binary. If a binary cannot be found, the script
218 prompts for one. Alternatively, you can supply the binary on the command line:
220 ./runtest /usr/exim/bin/exim
222 A matching test suite is released with each Exim release; if you use a test
223 suite that does not match the binary, some tests may fail.
225 The test suite uses some of the Exim utilities (such as exim_dbmbuild), and it
226 expects to find them in the same directory as Exim itself. If they are not
227 found, the tests that use them are omitted. A suitable comment is output.
229 On the ./runtest command line, following the name of the binary, if present,
230 there may be a number of options and then one or two numbers. The full syntax
233 ./runtest [binary name] [runtest options] [exim options] \
234 [first test] [last test]
236 There are some options for the ./runtest script itself:
238 -DEBUG This option is for debugging the test script. It causes some
239 tracing information to be output.
241 -DIFF By default, file comparisons are done using a private compare
242 command called "cf", which is built from source that is provided in
243 the src directory. This is a command I've had for nearly 20 years -
244 look at the source comments for its history - whose output I
245 prefer. However, if you want to use "diff" instead, give -DIFF as a
246 runtest option. In that case, "diff -u" is used for comparisons.
247 (If it turns out that most people prefer to use diff, I'll change
250 -KEEP Normally, after a successful run, the test output files are
251 deleted. This option prevents this. It is useful when running a
252 single test, in order to look at the actual output before it is
253 modified for comparison with saved output.
255 -NOIPV4 Pretend that an IPv4 interface was not found. This is useful for
256 testing that the test suite correctly skips tests that require
257 a running IPv4 interface.
259 -NOIPV6 Pretend that an IPv6 interface was not found. This is useful for
260 testing that the test suite correctly skips tests that require
261 a running IPv6 interface.
263 -UPDATE If this option is set, any detected changes in test output are
264 automatically accepted and used to update the stored copies of the
265 output. It is a dangerous option, but it useful for the test suite
266 maintainer after making a change to the code that affects a lot of
267 tests (for example, the wording of a message).
269 The options for ./runtest must be given first (but after the name of the
270 binary, if present). Any further options, that is, items on the command line
271 that start with a hyphen, are passed to the Exim binary when it is run as part
272 of a test. The only sensible use of this is to pass "-d" in order to run a test
273 with debugging enabled. Any other options are likely to conflict with options
274 that are set in the tests. Some tests are already set up to run with debugging.
275 In these cases, -d on the command line overrides their own debug settings.
277 The final two arguments specify the range of tests to be run. Test numbers lie
278 in the range 1 to 9999. If no numbers are given, the defaults are 1 and 8999
279 (sic). Tests with higher numbers (9000 upwards) are not run automatically
280 because they require specific data (such as a particular MySQL table) that is
281 unlikely to be generally available.
283 Tests that require certain optional features of Exim are grouped by number, so
284 in any given range, not all the tests will exist. Non-existent tests are just
285 skipped, but if there are no tests at all in the given range, a message is
288 If you give only one number, just that test is run (if it exists). Instead of a
289 second number, you can give the character "+", which is interpreted as "to the
290 end". Normally this is 8999; if the starting number is 9000 or higher, "+" is
291 interpreted as 9999. Examples:
295 ./runtest /usr/sbin/exim 5000 +
296 ./runtest -DIFF -d 81
298 When the script starts up, the first thing it does is to check that you have
299 sudo access to root. Then it outputs the version number of the Exim binary that
300 it is testing, and also information about the optional facilities that are
301 present (obtained from "exim -bV"). This is followed by some environmental
302 information, including the current login id and the hosts's IP address. The
303 script checks that the current user is in the Exim group, and that the Exim
304 user has access to the test suite directory.
306 The script outputs the list of tests requested, and a list of tests that will
307 be omitted because the relevant optional facilities are not in the binary. You
308 are then invited to press Return to start the tests running.
314 When all goes well, the only permanent output is the identity of the tests as
315 they are run, and "Script completed" for each test script, for example:
317 Basic/0001 Basic configuration setting
319 Basic/0002 Basic string expansions
321 Basic/0003 Caseless address blocking
323 Basic/0004 Caseful address blocking
325 Basic/0005 -bs to simple local delivery
328 While a script is running, it shows "Test n" on the screen, for each of the
329 Exim tests within the script. There may also be comments from some tests when a
330 delay is expected, for example, if there is a "sleep" while testing a timeout.
332 Before each set of optional tests, an extra identifying line is output. For
335 >>> The following tests require: authenticator cram_md5
336 CRAM-MD5/2500 CRAM-MD5 server tests
338 CRAM-MD5/2501 CRAM-MD5 client tests
341 If a test fails, you are shown the output of the text comparison that failed,
342 and prompted as to what to do next. The output is shown using the "less"
343 command, or "more" if "less" is not available. The options for "less" are set
344 to that it automatically exits if there is less that a screenful of output. By
345 default, the output is from the "cf" program, and might look like this:
347 DBM/1300 DBM files and exim_dbmbuild
349 Lines 7-9 of "test-stdout-munged" do not match lines 7-11 of "stdout/1300".
351 exim_dbmbuild exit code = 1
352 Continued set of lines is too long: max permitted length is 99999
353 exim_dbmbuild exit code = 1
356 exim_dbmbuild exit code = 2
357 Continued set of lines is too long: max permitted length is 99999
359 exim_dbmbuild exit code = 2
362 "test-stdout-munged" contains 16 lines; "stdout/1300" contains 18 lines.
364 Continue, Update & retry, Quit? [Q]
366 This example was generated by running the test with a version of Exim
367 that had a bug in the exim_dbmbuild utility (the bug was fixed at release
368 4.53). See "How the tests work" below for a description of the files that are
369 used. In this case, the standard output differed from what was expected.
371 The reply to the prompt must either be empty, in which case it takes the
372 default that is given in brackets (in this case Q), or a single letter, in
373 upper or lower case (in this case, one of C, U, or Q). If you type anything
374 else, the prompt is repeated.
376 "Continue" carries on as if the files had matched; that is, it ignores the
377 mismatch. Any other output files for the same test will be compared before
378 moving on to the next test.
380 "Update & retry" copies the new file to the saved file, and reruns the test
381 after doing any further comparisons that may be necessary.
383 Other circumstances give rise to other prompts. If a test generates output for
384 which there is no saved data, the prompt (after a message stating which file is
385 unexpectely not empty) is:
387 Continue, Show, or Quit? [Q]
389 "Show" displays the data on the screen, and then you get the "Continue..."
390 prompt. If a test ends with an unexpected return code, the prompt is:
392 show stdErr, show stdOut, Continue (without file comparison), or Quit? [Q]
394 Typically in these cases there will be something interesting in the stderr
395 or stdout output. There is a similar prompt after the "server" auxiliary
399 OPENSSL AND GNUTLS ERROR MESSAGES
400 ---------------------------------
402 Some of the TLS tests deliberately cause errors to check how Exim handles them.
403 It has been observed that different releases of the OpenSSL and GnuTLS
404 libraries generate different error messages. This may cause the comparison with
405 the saved output to fail. Such errors can be ignored.
411 . Some of the tests are time-sensitive (e.g. when testing timeouts, as in test
412 461). These may fail if run on a host that is also running a lot of other
415 . Some versions of "ls" use a different format for times and dates. This can
416 cause test 345 to fail.
418 . Test 0142 tests open file descriptors; on some hosts the output may vary.
421 OTHER SCRIPTS AND PROGRAMS
422 --------------------------
424 There is a freestanding Perl script called "listtests" that scans the test
425 scripts and outputs a list of all the tests, with a short descriptive comment
426 for each one. Special requirements for groups of tests are also noted.
428 The main runtest script makes use of a second Perl script and some compiled C
431 patchexim A Perl script that makes a patched version of Exim (see the
432 next section for details).
434 bin/cf A text comparison program (see above).
436 bin/checkaccess A program that is run as root; it changes uid/gid to the
437 Exim user and group, and then checks that it can access
438 files in the test suite's directory.
440 bin/client A script-driven SMTP client simulation.
442 bin/client-gnutls A script-driven SMTP client simulation with GnuTLS support.
443 This is built only if GnuTLS support is detected on the host.
445 bin/client-ssl A script-driven SMTP client simulation with OpenSSL support.
446 This is built only if OpenSSL support is detected on the
449 bin/fakens A fake "nameserver" for DNS tests (see below for details).
451 bin/fd A program that outputs details of open file descriptors.
453 bin/iefbr14 A program that does nothing, and returns 0. It's just like
454 the "true" command, but it is in a known place.
456 bin/loaded Some dynamically loaded functions for testing dlfunc support.
458 bin/mtpscript A script-driven SMTP/LMTP server simulation, on std{in,out}.
460 bin/server A script-driven SMTP server simulation, over a socket.
462 bin/showids Output the current uid, gid, euid, egid.
464 The runtest script also makes use of a number of ordinary commands such as
465 "cp", "kill", "more", and "rm", via the system() call. In some cases these are
466 run as root by means of sudo.
469 STANDARD SUBSTITUTIONS
470 ----------------------
472 In the following sections, there are several references to the "standard
473 substitutions". These make changes to some of the stored files when they are
474 used in a test. To save repetition, the substitutions themselves are documented
477 CALLER is replaced by the login name of the user running the tests
478 CALLERGROUP is replaced by the caller's group id
479 CALLER_GID is replaced by the caller's group id
480 CALLER_UID is replaced by the caller's user id
481 DIR is replaced by the name of the test-suite directory
482 EXIMGROUP is replaced by the name of the Exim group
483 EXIMUSER is replaced by the name of the Exim user
484 HOSTIPV4 is replaced by the local host's IPv4 address
485 HOSTIPV6 is replaced by the local host's IPv6 address
486 HOSTNAME is replaced by the local host's name
487 PORT_D is replaced by a port number for normal daemon use
488 PORT_N is replaced by a port number that should never respond
489 PORT_S is replaced by a port number for normal bin/server use
490 TESTNUM is replaced by the current test number
491 V4NET is replaced by an IPv4 network number for testing
492 V6NET is replaced by an IPv6 network number for testing
494 PORT_D is currently hard-wired to 1225, PORT_N to 1223, and PORT_S to 1224.
495 V4NET is hardwired to 224 and V6NET to ff00. These networks are used for DNS
496 testing purposes, and for testing Exim with -bh. The only requirement is that
497 they are networks that can never be used for an IP address of a real host. I've
498 chosen two multicast networks for the moment.
500 If the host has no IPv6 address, "<no IPv6 address found>" is substituted but
501 that does not matter because no IPv6 tests will be run. A similar substitution
502 is made if there is no IPv4 address, and again, tests that actually require a
503 running IPv4 interface should be skipped.
505 If the host has more than one IPv4 or IPv6 address, the first one that
506 "ifconfig" lists is used. If the only available address is 127.0.0.1 (or ::1
507 for IPv6) it is used, but another value is preferred if available.
509 In situations where a specific test is not being run (for example, when setting
510 up dynamic data files), TESTNUM is replaced by an empty string, but should not
511 in fact occur in such files.
517 Each numbered script runs Exim (sometimes several times) with its own Exim
518 configuration file. The configurations are stored in the "confs" directory,
519 and before running each test, a copy of the appropriate configuration, with the
520 standard substitutions, is made in the file test-config. The -C command line
521 option is used to tell Exim to use this configuration.
523 The -D option is used to pass the path of the Exim binary to the configuration.
524 This is not standardly substituted, because there are two possible binaries
525 that might be used in the same test (one setuid to root, the other to the exim
526 user). Some tests also make use of -D to vary the configuration for different
527 calls to the Exim binary.
529 Normally, of course, Exim gives up root privilege when -C and -D are used by
530 unprivileged users. We do not want this to happen when running the tests,
531 because we want to be able to test all aspects of Exim, including receiving
532 mail from unprivileged users. The way this is handled is as follows:
534 At the start of the runtest script, the patchexim script is run as root. This
535 script makes a copy of the Exim binary that is to be tested, patching it as it
536 does so. (This is a binary patch, not a source patch.) The patch causes the
537 binary, when run, to "know" that it is running in the test harness. It does not
538 give up root privilege when -C and -D are used, and in a few places it takes
539 other special actions, such as delaying when starting a subprocess to allow
540 debug output from the parent to be written first. If you want to know more,
541 grep the Exim source files for "running_in_test_harness".
543 The patched binary is placed in the directory eximdir/exim and given the normal
544 setuid root privilege. This is, of course, a dangerous binary to have lying
545 around, especially if there are unprivileged users on the system. To protect
546 it, the eximdir directory is created with the current user as owner, exim as
547 the group owner, and with access drwx--x---. Thus, only the user who is running
548 the tests (who is known to have access to root) and the exim user have access
549 to the modified Exim binary. When runtest terminates, the patched binary is
552 Each set of tests proceeds by interpreting its controlling script. The scripts
553 are in subdirectories of the "scripts" directory. They are split up according
554 to the requirements of the tests they contain, with the 0000-Basic directory
555 containing tests that can always be run. Run the "listtests" script to obtain a
562 Output from script runs is written to the files test-stdout and test-stderr.
563 When an Exim server is involved, test-stdout-server and test-stderr-server are
564 used for its output. Before being compared with the saved output, the
565 non-server and server files are concatenated, so a single saved file contains
568 A directory called spool is used for Exim's spool files, and for Exim logs.
569 These locations are specified in every test's configuration file.
571 When messages are delivered to files, the files are put in the test-mail
572 directory. Output from comparisons is written to test-cf.
574 Before comparisons are done, output texts are modified ("munged") to change or
575 remove parts that are expected to vary from run to run. The modified files all
576 end with the suffix "-munged". Thus, you will see test-stdout-munged,
577 test-mainlog-munged, test-mail-munged, and so on. Other files whose names start
578 with "test-" are created and used by some of the tests.
580 At the end of a successful test run, the spool directory and all the files
581 whose names begin with "test-" are removed. If the run ends unsuccessfully
582 (typically after a "Q" response to a prompt), the spool and test files are left
583 in existence so that the problem can be investigated.
589 Each test script consists of a list of commands, each optionally preceded by
590 comments (lines starting with #) and (also optionally) a line containing an
591 expected return code. Some of the commands are followed by data lines
592 terminated by a line of four asterisks.
594 The first line of each script must be a comment that briefly describes the
597 # -bS Use of HELO/RSET
599 A line consisting just of digits is interpreted as the expected return code
600 for the command that follows. The default expectation when no such line exists
601 is a zero return code. For example, here is a complete test script, containing
604 # -bS Unexpected EOF in headers
607 mail from:<someone@some.where>
608 rcpt to:<blackhole@HOSTNAME>
613 The expected return code in this case is 1, and the data lines are passed to
614 Exim on its standard input. Both the command line and the data lines have the
615 standard substitions applied to them. Thus, HOSTNAME in the example above will
616 be replaced by the local host's name. Long commands can be continued over
617 several lines by using \ as a continuation character. This does *not* apply to
620 Here follows a list of supported commands. They can be divided into two groups:
623 Commands with no input
624 ----------------------
626 These commands are not followed by any input data, or by a line of asterisks.
629 dbmbuild <file1> <file1>
631 This command runs the exim_dbmbuild utility to build a DBM file. It is used
632 only when DBM support is available in Exim, and typically follows the use of a
633 "write" command (see below) that creates the input file.
638 This command runs the exim_dumpdb utility on the testing spool directory, using
639 the database name given, for example: "dumpdb retry".
644 The text is written to the screen; this is used to output comments from
648 exim_lock [options] <file name>
650 This command runs the exim_lock utility with the given options and file name.
651 The file remains locked with the following command (normally exim) is obeyed.
656 This command runs the exinext utility with the given argument data.
661 This command runs the exigrep utility with the given data (the search pattern)
662 on the current mainlog file.
667 This command is present at the start of all but one of the tests that use
668 GnuTLS. It copies a pre-existing parameter file into the spool directory, so
669 that Exim does not have to re-create the file each time. The first GnuTLS test
670 does not do this, in order to test that Exim can create the file.
675 This command must be given in any script that starts an Exim daemon, normally
676 at the end. It searches for the PID file in the spool directory, and sends a
677 SIGINT signal to the Exim daemon process whose PID it finds. See below for
678 comments about starting Exim daemons.
683 This command causes the script to sleep for m milliseconds. Nothing is output
689 This command must be at the head of a script. If no IPv4 interface has been
690 found, the entire script is skipped, and a comment is output.
695 This command must be at the head of a script. If no IPv6 interface has been
696 found, the entire script is skipped, and a comment is output.
701 This command must be at the head of a script. If the Exim binary does not
702 suppport large files (off_t is <= 4), the entire script is skipped, and a
706 need_move_frozen_messages
708 This command must be at the head of a script. If the Exim binary does not have
709 support for moving frozen messages (which is an optional feature), the entire
710 script is skipped, and a comment is output.
715 If this command is encountered anywhere in the script, messages that are
716 delivered when the script runs are not compared with saved versions.
721 If this command is encountered anywhere in the script, message log files that
722 are still in existence at the end of the run (for messages that were not
723 delivered) are not compared with saved versions.
728 If this command is encountered anywhere in the script, the stderr output from
729 the run is not compared with a saved version.
734 If this command is encountered anywhere in the script, the stdout output from
735 the run is not compared with a saved version.
740 This command indicates that the script is for a certain type of filter test, in
741 which there are a lot of repetitive stdout lines that get in the way, because
742 filter tests output data about the sender and recipient. Such lines are removed
743 from the stdout output before comparing, for ease of human perusal.
748 This command causes the script to sleep for n seconds. If n is greater than
749 one, "sleep <n>" is output to the screen, followed by a dot for every second
755 This command causes special sorting to occur on the mainlog file before
756 comparison. Every sequence of contiguous delivery lines (lines containing the
757 => -> or *> flags) is sorted. This is necessary in some tests that use parallel
758 deliveries because on different systems the processes may terminate in a
762 A number of standard file management commands are also recognized. These are
763 cat, chmod, chown, cp, du, ln, ls, du, mkdir, mkfifo, rm, rmdir, and touch.
764 Some are run as root using "sudo".
770 The remaining commands are followed by data lines for their standard input,
771 terminated by four asterisks. Even if no data is required for the particular
772 usage, the asterisks must be given.
775 catwrite <file name> [nxm[=start-of-line-text]]*
777 This command operates like the "write" command, which is described below,
778 except that the data it generates is copied to the end of the test-stdout file
779 as well as to the named file.
783 client [<options>] <ip address> <port> [<outgoing interface>]
785 This command runs the auxiliary "client" program that simulates an SMTP client.
786 It is controlled by a script read from its standard input, details of which are
787 given below. There are two options. One is -t, which must be followed directly
788 by a number, to specify the command timeout in seconds (e.g. -t5). The default
789 timeout is 1 second. The other option is -tls-on-connect, which causes the
790 client to try to start up a TLS session as soon as it has connected, without
791 using the STARTTLS command. The client program connects to the given IP address
792 and port, using the specified interface, if one is given.
795 client-ssl [<options>] <ip address> <port> [<outgoing interface>] \
796 [<cert file>] [<key file>]
798 When OpenSSL is available on the host, an alternative version of the client
799 program is compiled, one that supports TLS using OpenSSL. The additional
800 arguments specify a certificate and key file when required. There is one
801 additional option, -tls-on-connect, that causes the client to initiate TLS
802 negotiation immediately on connection.
805 client-gnutls [<options>] <ip address> <port> [<outgoing interface>] \
806 [<cert file>] [<key file>]
808 When GnuTLS is available on the host, an alternative version of the client
809 program is compiled, one that supports TLS using GnuTLS. The additional
810 arguments specify a certificate and key file when required. There is one
811 additional option, -tls-on-connect, that causes the client to initiate TLS
812 negotiation immediately on connection.
815 exim [<options>] [<arguments>]
817 This command runs the testing version of Exim. Any occurrence of "$msg1" in the
818 command line is replaced by the ID of the first (oldest) message in Exim's
819 (testing) spool. "$msg2" refers to the second, and so on. The name "exim" can
820 be preceded by an environment setting as in this example:
822 LDAPTLS_REQCERT=never exim -be
824 It can also be preceded by a number; this specifies a number of seconds to wait
825 before closing the stdout pipe to Exim, and is used for some timeout tests. For
830 Finally, "exim" can be preceded by "sudo", to run Exim as root. If more than
831 one of these prefixes is present, they must be in the above order.
834 exim_exim [<options>] [<arguments>]
836 This runs an alternative version of Exim that is setuid to exim rather than to
840 server [<options>] <port or socket> [<connection count>]
842 This command runs the auxiliary "server" program that simulates an SMTP (or
843 other) server. It is controlled by a script that is read from its standard
844 input, details of which are given below. A number of options are implemented:
846 -d causes the server to output debugging information
848 -t sets a timeout in seconds (default 5) for when the server is
849 awaiting an incoming connection
851 -noipv4 causes the server not to set up an IPv4 socket
853 -noipv6 causes the server not to set up an IPv6 socket
855 By default, in an IPv6 environment, both kinds of socket are set up. However,
856 the test script knows which interfaces actually exist on the host, and it adds
857 -noipv4 or -noipv6 to the server command as required. An error occurs if both
858 these options are given.
860 The only required argument is either a port number or the path name of a Unix
861 domain socket. The port is normally PORT_S, which is changed to an actual
862 number by the standard substitutions. The optional final argument specifies the
863 number of different connections to expect (default 1). These must happen
864 serially (one at a time). There is no support for multiple simultaneous
865 connections. Here are some example commands:
868 server -t 10 PORT_S 3
869 server /tmp/somesocket
871 The following lines, up to a line of four asterisks, are the server's
872 controlling standard input (described below). These lines are read and
873 remembered; during the following commands, until an "exim" command is reached,
874 the server is run in parallel.
877 write <file name> [nxm[=start-of-line-text]]*
879 The "write" command is a way of creating files of specific sizes for buffering
880 tests, or containing specific data lines. Being able to do this from within the
881 script saves holding lots of little test files. The optional argument specifies
882 n lines of length m. The lines consist of the letter "a". If start of line text
883 is supplied, it replaces "a"s at the start of each line. Underscores in the
884 start of line text are turned into spaces. The optional argument may be
885 repeated. The data lines that follow a "write" command are split into two by a
886 line of four plus signs. Any above the split are written before the
887 fixed-length lines, and any below the split are written after. For example:
889 write test-data 3x30=AB_ 1x50
897 This command generates a file containing:
901 AB aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
902 AB aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
903 AB aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
904 aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
908 If there are no fixed-length line specifiers, there is no need to split the
909 data, and a line of plusses is not needed.
914 This command runs Perl, with the data as its standard input, to allow arbitrary
915 one-off things to be done.
921 Lines in client scripts are of two kinds:
923 (1) If a line begins with three question marks and a space, the rest of the
924 line defines the start of expected output from the server. If what is
925 received does not match, the client bombs out with an error message.
927 (2) If a line starts with three plus signs followed by a space, the rest of the
928 line specifies a number of seconds to sleep for before proceeding.
930 (3) Otherwise, the line is an input line line that is sent to the server. Any
931 occurrences of \r and \n in the line are turned into carriage return and
932 linefeed, respectively. This is used for testing PIPELINING.
934 Here is a simple example:
936 client 127.0.0.1 PORT_D
941 AUTH PLAIN AbdXi0AdnD2CVy
947 In the case of client-gnutls and client-ssl, if a command is "starttls", this
948 is remembered, and after a subsequent OK response, an attempt to move into TLS
949 mode occurs. If a command is "starttls_wait", the client sends "starttls" but
950 does not start up TLS; this is for testing timeouts. If a command is "stoptls",
951 an existing TLS connection is shut down, but nothing is sent.
957 The server program sleeps till a connection occurs or its timeout is reached,
958 in which case it bombs out. The next set of command lines are interpreted. They
959 are of the following kinds:
961 (1) A line that starts with '>' or with a digit is an output line that is sent
962 to the client. In the case of '>':
964 (a) If the line starts with ">>", no terminating CRLF is sent.
965 (b) If the line starts with ">CR>", just CR is sent at the end.
966 (c) If the line starts with ">LF>", just LF is sent at the end.
967 (d) If the line starts with ">*eof", nothing is sent and the connection
970 The data that is sent starts after the initial '>' sequence.
972 (2) A line that starts with "*sleep" specifies a number of seconds to wait
975 (3) A line containing "*eof" specifies that the client is expected to close
976 the connection at this point.
978 (4) A line containing just '.' specifies that the client is expected to send
979 many lines, terminated by one that contains just a dot.
981 (5) Otherwise, the line defines the start of an input line that the client
982 is expected to send. To allow for lines that start with digits, the line
983 may start with '<', which is not taken as part of the input data. If the
984 input does not match, the server bombs out with an error message.
986 Here is a simple example of server use in a test script:
1004 After a "server" command in a test script, the server runs in parallel until an
1005 "exim" command is reached. The "exim" command attempts to deliver one or more
1006 messages to port PORT_S on the local host. When it has finished, the test
1007 script waits for the "server" process to finish.
1009 The "mtpscript" program is like "server", except that it uses stdin/stdout for
1010 its input and output instead of a script. However, it is not called from test
1011 scripts; instead it is used as the command for pipe transports in some
1012 configurations, to simulate non-socket LMTP servers.
1015 AUXILIARY DATA FILES
1016 --------------------
1018 Many of the tests make use of auxiliary data files. There are two types; those
1019 whose content is fixed, and those whose content needs to be varied according to
1020 the current environment. The former are kept in the directory aux-fixed. The
1021 latter are distributed in the directory aux-var-src, and copied with the
1022 standard substitutions into the directory aux-var at the start of each test
1025 Most of the auxiliary files have names that start with a test number,
1026 indicating that they are specific to that one test. A few fixed files (for
1027 example, some TLS certificates) are used by more than one test, and so their
1028 names are not of this form.
1030 There are also some auxilary DNS zone files, which are described in the next
1034 DNS LOOKUPS AND GETHOSTBYNAME
1035 -----------------------------
1037 The original test suite required special testing zones to be loaded into a
1038 local nameserver. This is no longer a requirement for the new suite. Instead, a
1039 program called fakens is used to simulate a nameserver. When Exim is running in
1040 the test harness, instead of calling res_search() - the normal call to the DNS
1041 resolver - it calls a testing function. This handles a few special names itself
1042 (for compatibility with the old test suite), but otherwise passes the query to
1045 The fakens program consults "zone files" in the directory called dnszones, and
1046 returns data in the standard resource record format for Exim to process as if
1047 it came from the DNS. However, if the requested domain is not in any of the
1048 zones that fakens knows about, it returns a special code that causes Exim to
1049 pass the query on to res_search(). The zone files are:
1051 db.test.ex A zone for the domain test.ex.
1052 db.ip4.10 A zone for one special case in 10.250.0.0/16 (see below)
1053 db.ip4.V4NET A zone for the domain V4NET.in-addr.arpa.
1054 db.ip4.127 A zone for the domain 127.in-addr.arpa.
1055 db.ip6.V6NET A zone for the domain inverted(V6NET).ip6.arpa.
1056 db.ip6.0 A zone for the domain 0.ip6.arpa.
1058 V4NET and V6NET are substituted with the current testing networks (see above).
1059 In the case of V6NET, the network is four hex digits, and it is split and
1060 inverted appropriately when setting up the zone.
1062 These fake zone files are built dynamically from sources in the dnszones-src
1063 directory by applying the standard substitutions. The test suite also builds
1064 dynamic zone files for the name of the current host and its IP address(es). The
1065 idea is that there should not be any need to rely on an external DNS.
1067 The domain names that are handled directly by Exim, without being passed to
1070 test.again.dns This always provokes a TRY_AGAIN response, for testing the
1071 handling of temporary DNS error. If the full domain name
1072 starts with digits, a delay of that many seconds occurs.
1074 test.fail.dns This always provokes a NO_RECOVERY response, for testing
1075 DNS server failures.
1077 This special handling could now be done in the fakens program, but while the
1078 old test suite is still being used it has to be done in Exim itself, so for the
1079 moment it remains there.
1081 The use of gethostbyname() and its IPv6 friends is also subverted when Exim is
1082 running in the test harness. The test code handles a few special names
1083 directly; for all the others it uses DNS lookups, which are then handled as
1084 just described. Thus, the use of /etc/hosts is completely bypassed. The names
1085 that are specially handled are:
1087 manyhome.test.ex This name is used for testing hosts with ridiculously large
1088 numbers of IP addresses; 2048 IP addresses are generated
1089 and returned. Doing it this way saves having to make the
1090 interface to fakens handle more records that can fit in the
1091 data block. The addresses that are generated are in the
1092 10.250.0.0/16 network.
1094 localhost Always returns 127.0.0.1 or ::1, for IPv4 and IPv6 lookups,
1097 <an IP address> If the IP address is of the correct form for the lookup
1098 type (IPv4 or IPv6), it is returned. Otherwise a panic-die
1101 The reverse zone db.ip4.10 is provided just for the manyhome.test.ex case. It
1102 contains a single wildcard resource record. It also contains the line
1106 Whenever fakens finds this line in a zone file, it returns PASS_ON instead of
1107 HOST_NOT_FOUND. This causes Exim to pass the query to res_search().