[H-GEN] sendmail aliases

Tony Nugent tony at linuxworks.com.au
Mon Apr 15 06:10:16 EDT 2002


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On Mon Apr 15 2002 at 16:50, Robert Brockway wrote:

> > Wrong again, please clear up your misconceptions about how the aliases
> > file works - the mail does not need to be destined for a local mailbox,
> > it simply needs to be accepted for delivery to a domain hosted on that
> > machine.
> 
> aliases doesn't even have this limitation.  You can specify a remote email
> address on the RHS of the alaises file.  No problem at all.  I use this
> feature often.

Hmm, this is interesting.  I have three books here on sendmail (one
is the cd version of oreilly), as well as sendmail's cf/README,
doc/op/op.ps and web pages.

The senmail aliases file, its syntax and mechanisms of use are in
general very poorly documented.

The oreilly sendmail desktop reference says that alias (destination)
addresses are:

  "... either standard email addresses (a local user or alias name
  or a user at host, where comments and "Full Name <user at host>"
  syntaxes are acceptable), or a local user name prefixed with a
  backslash (which forces immediate delivery... )."

Note that it does not specify any restrictions as to where the RHS
address points to.  (Using non-local user at host addresses did not
work for me in the past, perhaps because of .cf config directives).


Ewan mentioned that he was using aliases with this format:

ewane: ewane at tenmail.mincom.oz.au.DIRECT
pgs: pgs at mtmail.mincom.oz.au.DIRECT

  (If the local mail server is mtmail, then why is the second entry
  needed at all?)

I can't find any mention of this `.DIRECT' syntax for aliases.

  I assume that this is supposed to force sendmail to deliver this
  email directly and exactly as specified for direct delivery for
  that user at that specific host.domain.  It seems to be an
  interesting alternative to using virtuser and mailer tables :)

  I know about the `.REDIRECT' feature that allows "551 User has
  moved" error failure messages, but no others.

  Where is this documented, and what other directives are available
  that can be applied like this?

Ewan, what is text of the actual error message you are getting when
you attempt to send email to your mtjoke alias?

Cheers
Tony

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