Date: Wed, 21 Feb 2001 13:26:44 -0500 From: "Ben" <ben@cahostnet.com> To: "Doug Poland" <doug@polands.org> Cc: <questions@freebsd.org> Subject: Re: Sendmail HELP HELP!!!! Message-ID: <002e01c09c33$da0093f0$6102a00a@nhqadmin17> References: <000f01c09c21$af56a980$6102a00a@nhqadmin17> <20010221111319.A24238@polands.org>
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Doug, Thanks a million. That helped alot. This is by far the most confusing thing I've read. I will go through the directory structure again and look over some files to make some sense out of them. Hopefully, someone else will reply. Thanks.... ----- Original Message ----- From: "Doug Poland" <doug@polands.org> To: "Ben" <ben@cahostnet.com> Cc: <questions@freebsd.org> Sent: Wednesday, February 21, 2001 12:13 PM Subject: Re: Sendmail HELP HELP!!!! > On Wed, Feb 21, 2001 at 11:16:42AM -0500, Ben wrote: > > I have a sendmail book and have read all of the README's and INSTALL > > files. These files aren't that friendly to me. Or at least I don't > > get it. It's too much. I was wondering if anyone could give me a > > simple version of how to compile the program and get started on the > > configurations. I have the book so I can go through all the options > > that way. I'm just having some problems getting it compiled and having > > all of it's files in the correct place. I downloaded the 8.11.2 file. > > Any help will be appreciated. If you have a web site that I can go to > > that has a simplified version that will be helpful as well. > > > > Please not I've gone to sendmail.org and read all their documentation, > > I just don't get it. > > > I'm in the same boat as you, but I've spent a day poking > around and found a few things. Here's what I've found. > I know I'll mis-state some things and am hoping more > knowledgeable people will correct me. > > It appears that the accepted way to config a sendmail > system is to use the m4 language to process .mc/.m4 > files into a working (hopefully) sendmail.cf file. The > sendmail book from O'Reilly and the FAQ on sendmail.org > are oriented towards this, as opposed to editing a pre-built > sendmail.cf directly. > > Using this technique (as opposed to building one from scratch) > you get all the advanced processing options (poor wording) and > can "easily" add your local rules in a more human friendly way. > > On a 4.2-RELEASE system, there are four important locations for > a sendmail config... > > (1) /usr/src/contrib/sendmail (.mc and .m4 files here) > (2) /usr/src/etc/sendmail > (3) /etc/mail > (4) /usr/share/sendmail (.mc and .m4 files here too) > > Directory(1) appears to be the location from which you would > compile sendmail itself and change various .mc files to build > your sendmail.cf file. > > Directory(2) contains the freebsd.mc file. It's the template > for how sendmail.cf is built on a -RELEASE system. Also > included is a bonus file (freefall.mc) that builds a sendmail.cf > for hosts that simply send mail to a central hub. > > Directory(3) is where you put your sendmail.cf and supplementary > files. > > I'm not sure why Directory(4) exists. Also, I don't know the > difference between a .mc and .m4 file. > > The idea is to to build a custom .mc file (see dir(2)) that has > your additional features, rules, and options. The result > is a sendmail.cf that you put in dir(3). If you are using > access, mailertable, virtusertable features, then you edit the > samples in dir(3) then run make from dir(3) and it builds > the Berkeley db files for those. > > This is the sum total of my knowledge so far. Now the question > is how do you write your .mc files to get the configuration > you want up and running. I'm trying to build a mail hub for > nine Unix clients and two MS-Win clients. For me, the clients > will always forward outbound mail to the hub and never receive > mail. The hub in turn will relay outbound email to my ISP's > SMTP server. The hub will use fetchmail to gather email from > several POP servers for users. Then the hub will run IMAP so > all the clients can see their email. > > Examining the freebsd.mc and freefall.mc has helped a lot. > Also, I got my dial-up ISP's sendmail.cf from his /etc directory. > It's a bare-bones config for relaying and has some useful > sender re-writing rules. > > Again, I re-state the fact that I'm a sendmail novice too > and I may be wrong in my explanations. I'm writing this > to organize my thoughts and help you as best I can. If a > sendmail guru wants to correct me and expand on this, > PLEASE do! > > -- > > Regards, > Doug > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message
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