sendmail, 4th Edition

The submit.cf File

The submit.cf file is built for you automatically when you install sendmail.^[39] When you run make install, the following is one of the commands executed:

cd ../../cf/cf && make install-submit-cf

This command will create and install a default /etc/mail/submit.cf file if that file does not already exist. For most sites, this default will be suitable for your use as is. If you customize at all, however, you will need to create your own submit.cf file. If, for example, you changed the user and group names for the non-set-user-id root version of sendmail with the following in your build m4 file:

define(`confMSPQOWN', `nullmail')
define(`confGBINGRP', `nullgroup')

you will need to create a custom submit.cf file. You create a custom submit.cf file just like you create a sendmail.cf file (Configure with m4 on page 587). You begin by creating a file called submit.mc. You can use the file cf/cf/submit.mc as a template for your own, or you can edit that file directly. If you edit that file directly, you will need to copy your changes to the same directory each time you upgrade sendmail to a new version.

Note that the name submit.cf is hardcoded and cannot be changed. When sendmail runs, unless you have built it to do otherwise, it will look for submit.cf in the same directory that it looks for its standard configuration file. If you change the location of the standard configuration file with the _PATH_SENDMAILCF build-time macro (_PATH... on page 131), you will also want to ...