Sendmail, 3rd Edition

Configuration Lines

Selected configuration file lines can be entered in rule-testing mode. They will behave just as they do when being read from the configuration file. For V8.8 sendmail and above, three configuration commands are honored:

#

Commands that begin with a # are treated as comments and ignored. Blank lines are also ignored.

D

The D configuration command (Section 21.3) is used to define a sendmail macro. Both single-character and multicharacter sendmail macro names can be used.

C

The C configuration command (Section 22.1) is used to add a value to a class. Both single-character and multicharacter class names can be used.

The # can begin a line. The other two configuration commands in rule-testing mode must begin with a dot:

.D{ntries} 23
.Cw localhost

Failure to use a dot will produce this error message:

Undefined ruleset Cw

The use of any character other than the two listed will produce this error:

Unknown "." command .bad command here

To get a usage message, just type a dot:

> .
Usage: .[DC]macro value(s)

Define a Macro with .D

The .D rule-testing command is used to define a sendmail macro. One use for this command might be to modify a rule that depends on the $& prefix (Section 21.5.3). For example, consider this small configuration file that contains a rule in parse rule set 0 that is intended to deliver a local user’s address via the local delivery agent:

V10
Sparse=0
R$+      $#local $@ $&X $: $1

If $X has a value, this rule returns that value as the host (the $@) part of a parse ...