NAME

checksendmail — verify sendmail address transformations.

SYNOPSIS

checksendmail [-a] [-d] [-b] [-C file.cf] [-b sendmail_binary] [-l log_file] [-r resolve] [-T test.address]

DESCRIPTION

The checksendmail program is a perl script that aids the testing of sendmail(8)'s various configuration files. checksendmail passes typical addresses (supplied in input files) through sendmail and prints the results of the resolution and transformation routines.

The input files contain a list of addresses, one per line. For example:

user
user@site
user@site.com

The input file can contain comments started with a # and blank lines.

OPTIONS

-a: Show aliasing of local addresses in mail address resolution phase of testing
-d: Precede each address translation line with ruleset sequence summary
-C file.cf: Use the sendmail configuration file file.cf instead of the default /etc/sendmail.cf file.
-b sendmail_binary: Use the specified sendmail_binary as the path to invoke sendmail (instead of /usr/sbin/sendmail).
-l log_file: Log sendmail address test mode debugging output to log_file
-r resolve: Use resolve as the input file for the addresses to be used for mail resolving. Defaults to address.resolve.
-T test.address: Use test.address as the single address to test. Cannot be used in conjunction with file setting flags.

EXAMPLES

The following command will pass the addresses in address.resolve through sendmail using the configuration information in myconfig.cf.

example% cat address.resolve
user
user@site
user@site.com

example% checksendmail -C myconfig.cf
system: myhost.gadget.com		current dir: /tmp/Checksendmail
resolve file: address.resolve
sendmail binary: /usr/sbin/sendmail	sendmail version: 8.9.3
config file: /etc/sendmail.cf		config file version: V8/Berkeley

Mail address resolution
user                        --(ether )-->  user[rmtc]
user@site                   --(ether )-->  user@site[rmtc]
user@site.com               --(ether )-->  user@site.com[rmtc]

`To' address transformations for mailer ether:
user                        ---->  user
user@site                   ---->  user@site
user@site.com               ---->  user@site.com

`From' address transformations for mailer ether:
user                        ---->  user
user@site                   ---->  user
user@site.com               ---->  user

The first section of the output shows how the addresses in the input files are resolved by sendmail(8). Consider the following output line:

user@site.com	--(ether )-->
  user@site.com[rmtc]

The input address user@site.com resolves to use the ether mailer. That mailer is directed to send the mail to to the user user@site.com at site rmtc (as indicated in the square brackets).

The two later sections of output show how the addresses specified as the To and From address are transformed in the text of the headers. In the example above, the To addresses are untouched. The From addresses, however, all lose their machine information on the way through the mailer:

user@site ----> user

This may be desirable when using a configuration file on a workstation which is to be hidden as a mailhost from the rest of the network.

The following is a set of addresses used at one site for the purposes of testing address resolution. Comments after the addresses detail why particular addresses are present:

user: Standard trivial address
user@rmtc: qualified at one level
user@rmtc.central: qualified at two levels
user@rmtc.central.sun.com: qualified all the way
rmtc!user: local but specified as uucp
user@summit: a workstation (normally delivered locally, though)
user@summit.central: same but more qualified
user@summit.central.sun.com: same but fully qualified
summit!user: same but specified as uucp
user@prisma: Backward compatibility tests
user@prisma.com
prisma!user
user@central: Superior domain testing
user@machine.central: more qualified, but unknown
user@summit.central: more qualified and known
user@eng: name in faraway domain
user@machine.eng: unknown machine in faraway domain
user@summit.eng: local machine, far away domain
user@hoback: far away machine
user@machine: apparently local but unknown machine
user@sun.com: Standard trivial address
user@machine.dom.sun.com: fully qualified but unknown machine
user@foo.com: standard, known, really far away domain
user@foo.dom: standard, unknown, really far away domain
site!user: Single level uucp
site1!site2!user: Double level uucp
user@foo.dom@bar.dom: Trickier address
site!user@foo.dom: Mixed uucp/domain
site!user@uunet.uu.net: Mixed double uucp/domain

NOTES

Note that checksendmail is a perl script. If your site does not have perl(1), it can be obtained via anonymous ftp from ftp.uu.net.

sendmail requires that the user have access to directory specified by the OQ parameter in the configuration file (normally /usr/spool/mqueue). checksendmail verifies that the user has access to this directory before allowing the test to continue.

AUTHORS

Gene Kim
Rob Kolstad
Jeff Polk

Modified by Robert Harker