NAME    [Toc]    [Back]

     aliases - aliases file for sendmail

SYNOPSIS    [Toc]    [Back]

     aliases

DESCRIPTION    [Toc]    [Back]

     This   file   describes   user   ID    aliases    used    by
/usr/sbin/sendmail.  The file
     resides  in  /etc/mail and is formatted as a series of lines
of the form

           name: addr_1, addr_2, addr_3, . . .

     The name is the name to alias, and the addr_n are the aliases for that
     name.   addr_n can be another alias, a local username, a local filename, a
     command, an include file, or an external address.

     Local Username
       username

       The username must be available via getpwnam(3).

     Local Filename
       /path/name

       Messages are appended to the file specified  by  the  full
pathname
       (starting with a slash (/))

     Command
       |command

       A  command starts with a pipe symbol (|), it receives messages via standard
 input.

     Include File
       :include: /path/name

       The aliases in pathname are added to the aliases for name.

     E-Mail Address
       user@domain

       An e-mail address in RFC 822 format.

     Lines beginning with whitespace are continuation lines.  Another way to
     continue lines is by placing a backslash directly  before  a
newline.
     Lines beginning with `#' are comments.

     Aliasing  occurs  only on local names.  Loops can not occur,
since no message
 will be sent to any person more than once.

     After aliasing has been done, local and valid recipients who
have a
     ``.forward'' file in their home directory have messages forwarded to the
     list of users defined in that file.

     This is only the raw data file; the actual aliasing information is placed
     into  a binary format in the file /etc/mail/aliases.db using
the program
     newaliases(8).  A newaliases command should be executed each
time the
     aliases file is changed for the change to take effect.

SEE ALSO    [Toc]    [Back]

     dbm(3), dbopen(3), newaliases(8), sendmail(8)

     Sendmail Installation and Operation Guide, No. 8, SMM.

     Sendmail - An Internetwork Mail Router, No. 9, SMM.

HISTORY    [Toc]    [Back]

     The aliases file format appeared in 4.0BSD.

BUGS    [Toc]    [Back]

     If  you  have  compiled sendmail with DBM support instead of
NEWDB, you may
     have encountered problems in  dbm(3)  restricting  a  single
alias to about
     1000  bytes  of  information.  You can get longer aliases by
``chaining'';
     that is, make the last name in the alias  be  a  dummy  name
which is a continuation
 alias.

OpenBSD      3.6                        December     14,     2000