Beyond Linux From Scratch - Version 6.0

Chapter 20. Mail/News Clients

Procmail-3.22

Introduction to Procmail

The Procmail package contains an autonomous mail processor. This is useful for filtering and sorting incoming mail.

Package information

Installation of Procmail

Install Procmail by running the following commands: 

make LOCKINGTEST=/tmp install &&
make install-suid

Command explanations

make LOCKINGTEST=/tmp install: This prevents make from asking you where to test file-locking patterns.

make install-suid: Modifies permissions of the installed files.

Configuring Procmail

Config files

/etc/procmailrc, ~/.procmailrc

Configuration Information

Recipes have to be written and placed in your ~/.procmailrc for execution. The procmailex man page is the starting place to learn how to write recipes.

Contents

The Procmail package contains procmail, formail, lockfile and mailstat.

Description

procmail

procmail is an autonomous mail processor. It performs all the functions of a MDA (Mail Delivery Agent).

formail

formail is a filter that can be used to format mail into mailbox format.

lockfile

lockfile is a utility that can lock a file for single use interactively or in a script.

mailstat

mailstat prints a summary report of mail that has been filtered by procmail since the last time mailstat was ran.

Last updated on 2005-02-11 15:17:38 -0700