4 This file contains descriptions of new features that have been added to Exim.
5 Before a formal release, there may be quite a lot of detail so that people can
6 test from the snapshots or the CVS before the documentation is updated. Once
7 the documentation is updated, this file is reduced to a short list.
12 1. The new perl_tainmode option allows to run the embedded perl
13 interpreter in taint mode.
19 1. The ACL conditions regex and mime_regex now capture substrings
20 into numeric variables $regex1 to 9, like the "match" expansion condition.
22 2. New $callout_address variable records the address used for a spam=,
23 malware= or verify= callout.
25 3. Transports now take a "max_parallel" option, to limit concurrency.
27 4. Expansion operators ${ipv6norm:<string>} and ${ipv6denorm:<string>}.
28 The latter expands to a 8-element colon-sep set of hex digits including
29 leading zeroes. A trailing ipv4-style dotted-decimal set is converted
30 to hex. Pure ipv4 addresses are converted to IPv4-mapped IPv6.
31 The former operator strips leading zeroes and collapses the longest
32 set of 0-groups to a double-colon.
34 5. New "-bP config" support, to dump the effective configuration.
36 6. New $dkim_key_length variable.
38 7. New base64d and base64 expansion items (the existing str2b64 being a
39 synonym of the latter). Add support in base64 for certificates.
41 8. New main configuration option "bounce_return_linesize_limit" to
42 avoid oversize bodies in bounces. The dafault value matches RFC
45 9. New $initial_cwd expansion variable.
51 1. Support for using the system standard CA bundle.
53 2. New expansion items $config_file, $config_dir, containing the file
54 and directory name of the main configuration file. Also $exim_version.
56 3. New "malware=" support for Avast.
58 4. New "spam=" variant option for Rspamd.
60 5. Assorted options on malware= and spam= scanners.
62 6. A commandline option to write a comment into the logfile.
64 7. If built with EXPERIMENTAL_SOCKS feature enabled, the smtp transport can
65 be configured to make connections via socks5 proxies.
67 8. If built with EXPERIMENTAL_INTERNATIONAL, support is included for
68 the transmission of UTF-8 envelope addresses.
70 9. If built with EXPERIMENTAL_INTERNATIONAL, an expansion item for a commonly
71 used encoding of Maildir folder names.
73 10. A logging option for slow DNS lookups.
75 11. New ${env {<variable>}} expansion.
77 12. A non-SMTP authenticator using information from TLS client certificates.
79 13. Main option "tls_eccurve" for selecting an Elliptic Curve for TLS.
80 Patch originally by Wolfgang Breyha.
82 14. Main option "dns_trust_aa" for trusting your local nameserver at the
89 1. If built with EXPERIMENTAL_DANE feature enabled, Exim will follow the
90 DANE smtp draft to assess a secure chain of trust of the certificate
91 used to establish the TLS connection based on a TLSA record in the
94 2. The EXPERIMENTAL_TPDA feature has been renamed to EXPERIMENTAL_EVENT
95 and several new events have been created. The reason is because it has
96 been expanded beyond just firing events during the transport phase. Any
97 existing TPDA transport options will have to be rewritten to use a new
98 $event_name expansion variable in a condition. Refer to the
99 experimental-spec.txt for details and examples.
101 3. The EXPERIMENTAL_CERTNAMES features is an enhancement to verify that
102 server certs used for TLS match the result of the MX lookup. It does
103 not use the same mechanism as DANE.
113 1. If built with the EXPERIMENTAL_PROXY feature enabled, Exim can be
114 configured to expect an initial header from a proxy that will make the
115 actual external source IP:host be used in exim instead of the IP of the
116 proxy that is connecting to it.
118 2. New verify option header_names_ascii, which will check to make sure
119 there are no non-ASCII characters in header names. Exim itself handles
120 those non-ASCII characters, but downstream apps may not, so Exim can
121 detect and reject if those characters are present.
123 3. New expansion operator ${utf8clean:string} to replace malformed UTF8
124 codepoints with valid ones.
126 4. New malware type "sock". Talks over a Unix or TCP socket, sending one
127 command line and matching a regex against the return data for trigger
128 and a second regex to extract malware_name. The mail spoolfile name can
129 be included in the command line.
131 5. The smtp transport now supports options "tls_verify_hosts" and
132 "tls_try_verify_hosts". If either is set the certificate verification
133 is split from the encryption operation. The default remains that a failed
134 verification cancels the encryption.
136 6. New SERVERS override of default ldap server list. In the ACLs, an ldap
137 lookup can now set a list of servers to use that is different from the
140 7. New command-line option -C for exiqgrep to specify alternate exim.conf
141 file when searching the queue.
143 8. OCSP now supports GnuTLS also, if you have version 3.1.3 or later of that.
145 9. Support for DNSSEC on outbound connections.
147 10. New variables "tls_(in,out)_(our,peer)cert" and expansion item
148 "certextract" to extract fields from them. Hash operators md5 and sha1
149 work over them for generating fingerprints, and a new sha256 operator
152 11. PRDR is now supported dy default.
154 12. OCSP stapling is now supported by default.
156 13. If built with the EXPERIMENTAL_DSN feature enabled, Exim will output
157 Delivery Status Notification messages in MIME format, and negociate
158 DSN features per RFC 3461.
164 1. New command-line option -bI:sieve will list all supported sieve extensions
165 of this Exim build on standard output, one per line.
166 ManageSieve (RFC 5804) providers managing scripts for use by Exim should
167 query this to establish the correct list to include in the protocol's
168 SIEVE capability line.
170 2. If the -n option is combined with the -bP option, then the name of an
171 emitted option is not output, only the value (if visible to you).
172 For instance, "exim -n -bP pid_file_path" should just emit a pathname
173 followed by a newline, and no other text.
175 3. When built with SUPPORT_TLS and USE_GNUTLS, the SMTP transport driver now
176 has a "tls_dh_min_bits" option, to set the minimum acceptable number of
177 bits in the Diffie-Hellman prime offered by a server (in DH ciphersuites)
178 acceptable for security. (Option accepted but ignored if using OpenSSL).
179 Defaults to 1024, the old value. May be lowered only to 512, or raised as
180 far as you like. Raising this may hinder TLS interoperability with other
181 sites and is not currently recommended. Lowering this will permit you to
182 establish a TLS session which is not as secure as you might like.
184 Unless you really know what you are doing, leave it alone.
186 4. If not built with DISABLE_DNSSEC, Exim now has the main option
187 dns_dnssec_ok; if set to 1 then Exim will initialise the resolver library
188 to send the DO flag to your recursive resolver. If you have a recursive
189 resolver, which can set the Authenticated Data (AD) flag in results, Exim
190 can now detect this. Exim does not perform validation itself, instead
191 relying upon a trusted path to the resolver.
193 Current status: work-in-progress; $sender_host_dnssec variable added.
195 5. DSCP support for outbound connections: on a transport using the smtp driver,
196 set "dscp = ef", for instance, to cause the connections to have the relevant
197 DSCP (IPv4 TOS or IPv6 TCLASS) value in the header.
199 Similarly for inbound connections, there is a new control modifier, dscp,
200 so "warn control = dscp/ef" in the connect ACL, or after authentication.
202 Supported values depend upon system libraries. "exim -bI:dscp" to list the
203 ones Exim knows of. You can also set a raw number 0..0x3F.
205 6. The -G command-line flag is no longer ignored; it is now equivalent to an
206 ACL setting "control = suppress_local_fixups". The -L command-line flag
207 is now accepted and forces use of syslog, with the provided tag as the
208 process name. A few other flags used by Sendmail are now accepted and
211 7. New cutthrough routing feature. Requested by a "control = cutthrough_delivery"
212 ACL modifier; works for single-recipient mails which are recieved on and
213 deliverable via SMTP. Using the connection made for a recipient verify,
214 if requested before the verify, or a new one made for the purpose while
215 the inbound connection is still active. The bulk of the mail item is copied
216 direct from the inbound socket to the outbound (as well as the spool file).
217 When the source notifies the end of data, the data acceptance by the destination
218 is negociated before the acceptance is sent to the source. If the destination
219 does not accept the mail item, for example due to content-scanning, the item
220 is not accepted from the source and therefore there is no need to generate
221 a bounce mail. This is of benefit when providing a secondary-MX service.
222 The downside is that delays are under the control of the ultimate destination
225 The Recieved-by: header on items delivered by cutthrough is generated
226 early in reception rather than at the end; this will affect any timestamp
227 included. The log line showing delivery is recorded before that showing
228 reception; it uses a new ">>" tag instead of "=>".
230 To support the feature, verify-callout connections can now use ESMTP and TLS.
231 The usual smtp transport options are honoured, plus a (new, default everything)
232 hosts_verify_avoid_tls.
234 New variable families named tls_in_cipher, tls_out_cipher etc. are introduced
235 for specific access to the information for each connection. The old names
236 are present for now but deprecated.
238 Not yet supported: IGNOREQUOTA, SIZE, PIPELINING.
240 8. New expansion operators ${listnamed:name} to get the content of a named list
241 and ${listcount:string} to count the items in a list.
243 9. New global option "gnutls_allow_auto_pkcs11", defaults false. The GnuTLS
244 rewrite in 4.80 combines with GnuTLS 2.12.0 or later, to autoload PKCS11
245 modules. For some situations this is desirable, but we expect admin in
246 those situations to know they want the feature. More commonly, it means
247 that GUI user modules get loaded and are broken by the setuid Exim being
248 unable to access files specified in environment variables and passed
249 through, thus breakage. So we explicitly inhibit the PKCS11 initialisation
250 unless this new option is set.
252 Some older OS's with earlier versions of GnuTLS might not have pkcs11 ability,
253 so have also added a build option which can be used to build Exim with GnuTLS
254 but without trying to use any kind of PKCS11 support. Uncomment this in the
257 AVOID_GNUTLS_PKCS11=yes
259 10. The "acl = name" condition on an ACL now supports optional arguments.
260 New expansion item "${acl {name}{arg}...}" and expansion condition
261 "acl {{name}{arg}...}" are added. In all cases up to nine arguments
262 can be used, appearing in $acl_arg1 to $acl_arg9 for the called ACL.
263 Variable $acl_narg contains the number of arguments. If the ACL sets
264 a "message =" value this becomes the result of the expansion item,
265 or the value of $value for the expansion condition. If the ACL returns
266 accept the expansion condition is true; if reject, false. A defer
267 return results in a forced fail.
269 11. Routers and transports can now have multiple headers_add and headers_remove
270 option lines. The concatenated list is used.
272 12. New ACL modifier "remove_header" can remove headers before message gets
273 handled by routers/transports.
275 13. New dnsdb lookup pseudo-type "a+". A sequence of "a6" (if configured),
276 "aaaa" and "a" lookups is done and the full set of results returned.
278 14. New expansion variable $headers_added with content from ACL add_header
279 modifier (but not yet added to message).
281 15. New 8bitmime status logging option for received messages. Log field "M8S".
283 16. New authenticated_sender logging option, adding to log field "A".
285 17. New expansion variables $router_name and $transport_name. Useful
286 particularly for debug_print as -bt commandline option does not
287 require privilege whereas -d does.
289 18. If built with EXPERIMENTAL_PRDR, per-recipient data responses per a
290 proposed extension to SMTP from Eric Hall.
292 19. The pipe transport has gained the force_command option, to allow
293 decorating commands from user .forward pipe aliases with prefix
294 wrappers, for instance.
296 20. Callout connections can now AUTH; the same controls as normal delivery
299 21. Support for DMARC, using opendmarc libs, can be enabled. It adds new
300 options: dmarc_forensic_sender, dmarc_history_file, and dmarc_tld_file.
301 It adds new expansion variables $dmarc_ar_header, $dmarc_status,
302 $dmarc_status_text, and $dmarc_used_domain. It adds a new acl modifier
303 dmarc_status. It adds new control flags dmarc_disable_verify and
304 dmarc_enable_forensic.
306 22. Add expansion variable $authenticated_fail_id, which is the username
307 provided to the authentication method which failed. It is available
308 for use in subsequent ACL processing (typically quit or notquit ACLs).
310 23. New ACL modifer "udpsend" can construct a UDP packet to send to a given
313 24. New ${hexquote:..string..} expansion operator converts non-printable
314 characters in the string to \xNN form.
316 25. Experimental TPDA (Transport Post Delivery Action) function added.
317 Patch provided by Axel Rau.
319 26. Experimental Redis lookup added. Patch provided by Warren Baker.
325 1. New authenticator driver, "gsasl". Server-only (at present).
326 This is a SASL interface, licensed under GPL, which can be found at
327 http://www.gnu.org/software/gsasl/.
328 This system does not provide sources of data for authentication, so
329 careful use needs to be made of the conditions in Exim.
331 2. New authenticator driver, "heimdal_gssapi". Server-only.
332 A replacement for using cyrus_sasl with Heimdal, now that $KRB5_KTNAME
333 is no longer honoured for setuid programs by Heimdal. Use the
334 "server_keytab" option to point to the keytab.
336 3. The "pkg-config" system can now be used when building Exim to reference
337 cflags and library information for lookups and authenticators, rather
338 than having to update "CFLAGS", "AUTH_LIBS", "LOOKUP_INCLUDE" and
339 "LOOKUP_LIBS" directly. Similarly for handling the TLS library support
340 without adjusting "TLS_INCLUDE" and "TLS_LIBS".
342 In addition, setting PCRE_CONFIG=yes will query the pcre-config tool to
343 find the headers and libraries for PCRE.
345 4. New expansion variable $tls_bits.
347 5. New lookup type, "dbmjz". Key is an Exim list, the elements of which will
348 be joined together with ASCII NUL characters to construct the key to pass
349 into the DBM library. Can be used with gsasl to access sasldb2 files as
352 6. OpenSSL now supports TLS1.1 and TLS1.2 with OpenSSL 1.0.1.
354 Avoid release 1.0.1a if you can. Note that the default value of
355 "openssl_options" is no longer "+dont_insert_empty_fragments", as that
356 increased susceptibility to attack. This may still have interoperability
357 implications for very old clients (see version 4.31 change 37) but
358 administrators can choose to make the trade-off themselves and restore
359 compatibility at the cost of session security.
361 7. Use of the new expansion variable $tls_sni in the main configuration option
362 tls_certificate will cause Exim to re-expand the option, if the client
363 sends the TLS Server Name Indication extension, to permit choosing a
364 different certificate; tls_privatekey will also be re-expanded. You must
365 still set these options to expand to valid files when $tls_sni is not set.
367 The SMTP Transport has gained the option tls_sni, which will set a hostname
368 for outbound TLS sessions, and set $tls_sni too.
370 A new log_selector, +tls_sni, has been added, to log received SNI values
371 for Exim as a server.
373 8. The existing "accept_8bitmime" option now defaults to true. This means
374 that Exim is deliberately not strictly RFC compliant. We're following
375 Dan Bernstein's advice in http://cr.yp.to/smtp/8bitmime.html by default.
376 Those who disagree, or know that they are talking to mail servers that,
377 even today, are not 8-bit clean, need to turn off this option.
379 9. Exim can now be started with -bw (with an optional timeout, given as
380 -bw<timespec>). With this, stdin at startup is a socket that is
381 already listening for connections. This has a more modern name of
382 "socket activation", but forcing the activated socket to fd 0. We're
383 interested in adding more support for modern variants.
385 10. ${eval } now uses 64-bit values on supporting platforms. A new "G" suffix
386 for numbers indicates multiplication by 1024^3.
388 11. The GnuTLS support has been revamped; the three options gnutls_require_kx,
389 gnutls_require_mac & gnutls_require_protocols are no longer supported.
390 tls_require_ciphers is now parsed by gnutls_priority_init(3) as a priority
391 string, documentation for which is at:
392 http://www.gnutls.org/manual/html_node/Priority-Strings.html
394 SNI support has been added to Exim's GnuTLS integration too.
396 For sufficiently recent GnuTLS libraries, ${randint:..} will now use
397 gnutls_rnd(), asking for GNUTLS_RND_NONCE level randomness.
399 12. With OpenSSL, if built with EXPERIMENTAL_OCSP, a new option tls_ocsp_file
400 is now available. If the contents of the file are valid, then Exim will
401 send that back in response to a TLS status request; this is OCSP Stapling.
402 Exim will not maintain the contents of the file in any way: administrators
403 are responsible for ensuring that it is up-to-date.
405 See "experimental-spec.txt" for more details.
407 13. ${lookup dnsdb{ }} supports now SPF record types. They are handled
408 identically to TXT record lookups.
410 14. New expansion variable $tod_epoch_l for higher-precision time.
412 15. New global option tls_dh_max_bits, defaulting to current value of NSS
413 hard-coded limit of DH ephemeral bits, to fix interop problems caused by
414 GnuTLS 2.12 library recommending a bit count higher than NSS supports.
416 16. tls_dhparam now used by both OpenSSL and GnuTLS, can be path or identifier.
417 Option can now be a path or an identifier for a standard prime.
418 If unset, we use the DH prime from section 2.2 of RFC 5114, "ike23".
419 Set to "historic" to get the old GnuTLS behaviour of auto-generated DH
422 17. SSLv2 now disabled by default in OpenSSL. (Never supported by GnuTLS).
423 Use "openssl_options -no_sslv2" to re-enable support, if your OpenSSL
424 install was not built with OPENSSL_NO_SSL2 ("no-ssl2").
430 1. New options for the ratelimit ACL condition: /count= and /unique=.
431 The /noupdate option has been replaced by a /readonly option.
433 2. The SMTP transport's protocol option may now be set to "smtps", to
434 use SSL-on-connect outbound.
436 3. New variable $av_failed, set true if the AV scanner deferred; ie, when
437 there is a problem talking to the AV scanner, or the AV scanner running.
439 4. New expansion conditions, "inlist" and "inlisti", which take simple lists
440 and check if the search item is a member of the list. This does not
441 support named lists, but does subject the list part to string expansion.
443 5. Unless the new EXPAND_LISTMATCH_RHS build option is set when Exim was
444 built, Exim no longer performs string expansion on the second string of
445 the match_* expansion conditions: "match_address", "match_domain",
446 "match_ip" & "match_local_part". Named lists can still be used.
452 1. The global option "dns_use_edns0" may be set to coerce EDNS0 usage on
453 or off in the resolver library.
459 1. In addition to the existing LDAP and LDAP/SSL ("ldaps") support, there
460 is now LDAP/TLS support, given sufficiently modern OpenLDAP client
461 libraries. The following global options have been added in support of
462 this: ldap_ca_cert_dir, ldap_ca_cert_file, ldap_cert_file, ldap_cert_key,
463 ldap_cipher_suite, ldap_require_cert, ldap_start_tls.
465 2. The pipe transport now takes a boolean option, "freeze_signal", default
466 false. When true, if the external delivery command exits on a signal then
467 Exim will freeze the message in the queue, instead of generating a bounce.
469 3. Log filenames may now use %M as an escape, instead of %D (still available).
470 The %M pattern expands to yyyymm, providing month-level resolution.
472 4. The $message_linecount variable is now updated for the maildir_tag option,
473 in the same way as $message_size, to reflect the real number of lines,
474 including any header additions or removals from transport.
476 5. When contacting a pool of SpamAssassin servers configured in spamd_address,
477 Exim now selects entries randomly, to better scale in a cluster setup.
483 1. SECURITY FIX: privilege escalation flaw fixed. On Linux (and only Linux)
484 the flaw permitted the Exim run-time user to cause root to append to
485 arbitrary files of the attacker's choosing, with the content based
486 on content supplied by the attacker.
488 2. Exim now supports loading some lookup types at run-time, using your
489 platform's dlopen() functionality. This has limited platform support
490 and the intention is not to support every variant, it's limited to
491 dlopen(). This permits the main Exim binary to not be linked against
492 all the libraries needed for all the lookup types.
498 NOTE: this version is not guaranteed backwards-compatible, please read the
499 items below carefully
501 1. A new main configuration option, "openssl_options", is available if Exim
502 is built with SSL support provided by OpenSSL. The option allows
503 administrators to specify OpenSSL options to be used on connections;
504 typically this is to set bug compatibility features which the OpenSSL
505 developers have not enabled by default. There may be security
506 consequences for certain options, so these should not be changed
509 2. A new pipe transport option, "permit_coredumps", may help with problem
510 diagnosis in some scenarios. Note that Exim is typically installed as
511 a setuid binary, which on most OSes will inhibit coredumps by default,
512 so that safety mechanism would have to be overridden for this option to
513 be able to take effect.
515 3. ClamAV 0.95 is now required for ClamAV support in Exim, unless
516 Local/Makefile sets: WITH_OLD_CLAMAV_STREAM=yes
517 Note that this switches Exim to use a new API ("INSTREAM") and a future
518 release of ClamAV will remove support for the old API ("STREAM").
520 The av_scanner option, when set to "clamd", now takes an optional third
521 part, "local", which causes Exim to pass a filename to ClamAV instead of
522 the file content. This is the same behaviour as when clamd is pointed at
523 a Unix-domain socket. For example:
525 av_scanner = clamd:192.0.2.3 1234:local
527 ClamAV's ExtendedDetectionInfo response format is now handled.
529 4. There is now a -bmalware option, restricted to admin users. This option
530 takes one parameter, a filename, and scans that file with Exim's
531 malware-scanning framework. This is intended purely as a debugging aid
532 to ensure that Exim's scanning is working, not to replace other tools.
533 Note that the ACL framework is not invoked, so if av_scanner references
534 ACL variables without a fallback then this will fail.
536 5. There is a new expansion operator, "reverse_ip", which will reverse IP
537 addresses; IPv4 into dotted quad, IPv6 into dotted nibble. Examples:
539 ${reverse_ip:192.0.2.4}
541 ${reverse_ip:2001:0db8:c42:9:1:abcd:192.0.2.3}
542 -> 3.0.2.0.0.0.0.c.d.c.b.a.1.0.0.0.9.0.0.0.2.4.c.0.8.b.d.0.1.0.0.2
544 6. There is a new ACL control called "debug", to enable debug logging.
545 This allows selective logging of certain incoming transactions within
546 production environments, with some care. It takes two options, "tag"
547 and "opts"; "tag" is included in the filename of the log and "opts"
548 is used as per the -d<options> command-line option. Examples, which
549 don't all make sense in all contexts:
552 control = debug/tag=.$sender_host_address
553 control = debug/opts=+expand+acl
554 control = debug/tag=.$message_exim_id/opts=+expand
556 7. It has always been implicit in the design and the documentation that
557 "the Exim user" is not root. src/EDITME said that using root was
558 "very strongly discouraged". This is not enough to keep people from
559 shooting themselves in the foot in days when many don't configure Exim
560 themselves but via package build managers. The security consequences of
561 running various bits of network code are severe if there should be bugs in
562 them. As such, the Exim user may no longer be root. If configured
563 statically, Exim will refuse to build. If configured as ref:user then Exim
564 will exit shortly after start-up. If you must shoot yourself in the foot,
565 then henceforth you will have to maintain your own local patches to strip
568 8. There is a new expansion condition, bool_lax{}. Where bool{} uses the ACL
569 condition logic to determine truth/failure and will fail to expand many
570 strings, bool_lax{} uses the router condition logic, where most strings
572 Note: bool{00} is false, bool_lax{00} is true.
574 9. Routers now support multiple "condition" tests.
576 10. There is now a runtime configuration option "tcp_wrappers_daemon_name".
577 Setting this allows an admin to define which entry in the tcpwrappers
578 config file will be used to control access to the daemon. This option
579 is only available when Exim is built with USE_TCP_WRAPPERS. The
580 default value is set at build time using the TCP_WRAPPERS_DAEMON_NAME
583 11. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] The default value for system_filter_user is now
584 the Exim run-time user, instead of root.
586 12. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] ALT_CONFIG_ROOT_ONLY is no longer optional and
587 is forced on. This is mitigated by the new build option
588 TRUSTED_CONFIG_LIST which defines a list of configuration files which
589 are trusted; one per line. If a config file is owned by root and matches
590 a pathname in the list, then it may be invoked by the Exim build-time
591 user without Exim relinquishing root privileges.
593 13. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] The Exim user is no longer automatically
594 trusted to supply -D<Macro[=Value]> overrides on the command-line. Going
595 forward, we recommend using TRUSTED_CONFIG_LIST with shim configs that
596 include the main config. As a transition mechanism, we are temporarily
597 providing a work-around: the new build option WHITELIST_D_MACROS provides
598 a colon-separated list of macro names which may be overridden by the Exim
599 run-time user. The values of these macros are constrained to the regex
600 ^[A-Za-z0-9_/.-]*$ (which explicitly does allow for empty values).
606 1. TWO SECURITY FIXES: one relating to mail-spools which are globally
607 writable, the other to locking of MBX folders (not mbox).
609 2. MySQL stored procedures are now supported.
611 3. The dkim_domain transport option is now a list, not a single string, and
612 messages will be signed for each element in the list (discarding
615 4. The 4.70 release unexpectedly changed the behaviour of dnsdb TXT lookups
616 in the presence of multiple character strings within the RR. Prior to 4.70,
617 only the first string would be returned. The dnsdb lookup now, by default,
618 preserves the pre-4.70 semantics, but also now takes an extended output
619 separator specification. The separator can be followed by a semicolon, to
620 concatenate the individual text strings together with no join character,
621 or by a comma and a second separator character, in which case the text
622 strings within a TXT record are joined on that second character.
623 Administrators are reminded that DNS provides no ordering guarantees
624 between multiple records in an RRset. For example:
626 foo.example. IN TXT "a" "b" "c"
627 foo.example. IN TXT "d" "e" "f"
629 ${lookup dnsdb{>/ txt=foo.example}} -> "a/d"
630 ${lookup dnsdb{>/; txt=foo.example}} -> "def/abc"
631 ${lookup dnsdb{>/,+ txt=foo.example}} -> "a+b+c/d+e+f"
637 1. Native DKIM support without an external library.
638 (Note that if no action to prevent it is taken, a straight upgrade will
639 result in DKIM verification of all signed incoming emails. See spec
640 for details on conditionally disabling)
642 2. Experimental DCC support via dccifd (contributed by Wolfgang Breyha).
644 3. There is now a bool{} expansion condition which maps certain strings to
645 true/false condition values (most likely of use in conjunction with the
646 and{} expansion operator).
648 4. The $spam_score, $spam_bar and $spam_report variables are now available
651 5. exim -bP now supports "macros", "macro_list" or "macro MACRO_NAME" as
652 options, provided that Exim is invoked by an admin_user.
654 6. There is a new option gnutls_compat_mode, when linked against GnuTLS,
655 which increases compatibility with older clients at the cost of decreased
656 security. Don't set this unless you need to support such clients.
658 7. There is a new expansion operator, ${randint:...} which will produce a
659 "random" number less than the supplied integer. This randomness is
660 not guaranteed to be cryptographically strong, but depending upon how
661 Exim was built may be better than the most naive schemes.
663 8. Exim now explicitly ensures that SHA256 is available when linked against
666 9. The transport_filter_timeout option now applies to SMTP transports too.
672 1. Preliminary DKIM support in Experimental.
678 1. The body_linecount and body_zerocount C variables are now exported in the
681 2. When a dnslists lookup succeeds, the key that was looked up is now placed
682 in $dnslist_matched. When the key is an IP address, it is not reversed in
683 this variable (though it is, of course, in the actual lookup). In simple
686 deny dnslists = spamhaus.example
688 the key is also available in another variable (in this case,
689 $sender_host_address). In more complicated cases, however, this is not
690 true. For example, using a data lookup might generate a dnslists lookup
693 deny dnslists = spamhaus.example/<|192.168.1.2|192.168.6.7|...
695 If this condition succeeds, the value in $dnslist_matched might be
696 192.168.6.7 (for example).
698 3. Authenticators now have a client_condition option. When Exim is running as
699 a client, it skips an authenticator whose client_condition expansion yields
700 "0", "no", or "false". This can be used, for example, to skip plain text
701 authenticators when the connection is not encrypted by a setting such as:
703 client_condition = ${if !eq{$tls_cipher}{}}
705 Note that the 4.67 documentation states that $tls_cipher contains the
706 cipher used for incoming messages. In fact, during SMTP delivery, it
707 contains the cipher used for the delivery. The same is true for
710 4. There is now a -Mvc <message-id> option, which outputs a copy of the
711 message to the standard output, in RFC 2822 format. The option can be used
712 only by an admin user.
714 5. There is now a /noupdate option for the ratelimit ACL condition. It
715 computes the rate and checks the limit as normal, but it does not update
716 the saved data. This means that, in relevant ACLs, it is possible to lookup
717 the existence of a specified (or auto-generated) ratelimit key without
718 incrementing the ratelimit counter for that key.
720 In order for this to be useful, another ACL entry must set the rate
721 for the same key somewhere (otherwise it will always be zero).
726 # Read the rate; if it doesn't exist or is below the maximum
728 deny ratelimit = 100 / 5m / strict / noupdate
729 log_message = RATE: $sender_rate / $sender_rate_period \
730 (max $sender_rate_limit)
732 [... some other logic and tests...]
734 warn ratelimit = 100 / 5m / strict / per_cmd
735 log_message = RATE UPDATE: $sender_rate / $sender_rate_period \
736 (max $sender_rate_limit)
737 condition = ${if le{$sender_rate}{$sender_rate_limit}}
741 6. The variable $max_received_linelength contains the number of bytes in the
742 longest line that was received as part of the message, not counting the
743 line termination character(s).
745 7. Host lists can now include +ignore_defer and +include_defer, analagous to
746 +ignore_unknown and +include_unknown. These options should be used with
747 care, probably only in non-critical host lists such as whitelists.
749 8. There's a new option called queue_only_load_latch, which defaults true.
750 If set false when queue_only_load is greater than zero, Exim re-evaluates
751 the load for each incoming message in an SMTP session. Otherwise, once one
752 message is queued, the remainder are also.
754 9. There is a new ACL, specified by acl_smtp_notquit, which is run in most
755 cases when an SMTP session ends without sending QUIT. However, when Exim
756 itself is is bad trouble, such as being unable to write to its log files,
757 this ACL is not run, because it might try to do things (such as write to
758 log files) that make the situation even worse.
760 Like the QUIT ACL, this new ACL is provided to make it possible to gather
761 statistics. Whatever it returns (accept or deny) is immaterial. The "delay"
762 modifier is forbidden in this ACL.
764 When the NOTQUIT ACL is running, the variable $smtp_notquit_reason is set
765 to a string that indicates the reason for the termination of the SMTP
766 connection. The possible values are:
768 acl-drop Another ACL issued a "drop" command
769 bad-commands Too many unknown or non-mail commands
770 command-timeout Timeout while reading SMTP commands
771 connection-lost The SMTP connection has been lost
772 data-timeout Timeout while reading message data
773 local-scan-error The local_scan() function crashed
774 local-scan-timeout The local_scan() function timed out
775 signal-exit SIGTERM or SIGINT
776 synchronization-error SMTP synchronization error
777 tls-failed TLS failed to start
779 In most cases when an SMTP connection is closed without having received
780 QUIT, Exim sends an SMTP response message before actually closing the
781 connection. With the exception of acl-drop, the default message can be
782 overridden by the "message" modifier in the NOTQUIT ACL. In the case of a
783 "drop" verb in another ACL, it is the message from the other ACL that is
786 10. For MySQL and PostgreSQL lookups, it is now possible to specify a list of
787 servers with individual queries. This is done by starting the query with
788 "servers=x:y:z;", where each item in the list may take one of two forms:
790 (1) If it is just a host name, the appropriate global option (mysql_servers
791 or pgsql_servers) is searched for a host of the same name, and the
792 remaining parameters (database, user, password) are taken from there.
794 (2) If it contains any slashes, it is taken as a complete parameter set.
796 The list of servers is used in exactly the same was as the global list.
797 Once a connection to a server has happened and a query has been
798 successfully executed, processing of the lookup ceases.
800 This feature is intended for use in master/slave situations where updates
801 are occurring, and one wants to update a master rather than a slave. If the
802 masters are in the list for reading, you might have:
804 mysql_servers = slave1/db/name/pw:slave2/db/name/pw:master/db/name/pw
806 In an updating lookup, you could then write
808 ${lookup mysql{servers=master; UPDATE ...}
810 If, on the other hand, the master is not to be used for reading lookups:
812 pgsql_servers = slave1/db/name/pw:slave2/db/name/pw
814 you can still update the master by
816 ${lookup pgsql{servers=master/db/name/pw; UPDATE ...}
818 11. The message_body_newlines option (default FALSE, for backwards
819 compatibility) can be used to control whether newlines are present in
820 $message_body and $message_body_end. If it is FALSE, they are replaced by
827 1. There is a new log selector called smtp_no_mail, which is not included in
828 the default setting. When it is set, a line is written to the main log
829 whenever an accepted SMTP connection terminates without having issued a
832 2. When an item in a dnslists list is followed by = and & and a list of IP
833 addresses, the behaviour was not clear when the lookup returned more than
834 one IP address. This has been solved by the addition of == and =& for "all"
835 rather than the default "any" matching.
837 3. Up till now, the only control over which cipher suites GnuTLS uses has been
838 for the cipher algorithms. New options have been added to allow some of the
839 other parameters to be varied.
841 4. There is a new compile-time option called ENABLE_DISABLE_FSYNC. When it is
842 set, Exim compiles a runtime option called disable_fsync.
844 5. There is a new variable called $smtp_count_at_connection_start.
846 6. There's a new control called no_pipelining.
848 7. There are two new variables called $sending_ip_address and $sending_port.
849 These are set whenever an SMTP connection to another host has been set up.
851 8. The expansion of the helo_data option in the smtp transport now happens
852 after the connection to the server has been made.
854 9. There is a new expansion operator ${rfc2047d: that decodes strings that
855 are encoded as per RFC 2047.
857 10. There is a new log selector called "pid", which causes the current process
858 id to be added to every log line, in square brackets, immediately after the
861 11. Exim has been modified so that it flushes SMTP output before implementing
862 a delay in an ACL. It also flushes the output before performing a callout,
863 as this can take a substantial time. These behaviours can be disabled by
864 obeying control = no_delay_flush or control = no_callout_flush,
865 respectively, at some earlier stage of the connection.
867 12. There are two new expansion conditions that iterate over a list. They are
868 called forany and forall.
870 13. There's a new global option called dsn_from that can be used to vary the
871 contents of From: lines in bounces and other automatically generated
872 messages ("delivery status notifications" - hence the name of the option).
874 14. The smtp transport has a new option called hosts_avoid_pipelining.
876 15. By default, exigrep does case-insensitive matches. There is now a -I option
877 that makes it case-sensitive.
879 16. A number of new features ("addresses", "map", "filter", and "reduce") have
880 been added to string expansions to make it easier to process lists of
881 items, typically addresses.
883 17. There's a new ACL modifier called "continue". It does nothing of itself,
884 and processing of the ACL always continues with the next condition or
885 modifier. It is provided so that the side effects of expanding its argument
888 18. It is now possible to use newline and other control characters (those with
889 values less than 32, plus DEL) as separators in lists.
891 19. The exigrep utility now has a -v option, which inverts the matching
894 20. The host_find_failed option in the manualroute router can now be set to
901 No new features were added to 4.66.
907 No new features were added to 4.65.
913 1. ACL variables can now be given arbitrary names, as long as they start with
914 "acl_c" or "acl_m" (for connection variables and message variables), are at
915 least six characters long, with the sixth character being either a digit or
918 2. There is a new ACL modifier called log_reject_target. It makes it possible
919 to specify which logs are used for messages about ACL rejections.
921 3. There is a new authenticator called "dovecot". This is an interface to the
922 authentication facility of the Dovecot POP/IMAP server, which can support a
923 number of authentication methods.
925 4. The variable $message_headers_raw provides a concatenation of all the
926 messages's headers without any decoding. This is in contrast to
927 $message_headers, which does RFC2047 decoding on the header contents.
929 5. In a DNS black list, if two domain names, comma-separated, are given, the
930 second is used first to do an initial check, making use of any IP value
931 restrictions that are set. If there is a match, the first domain is used,
932 without any IP value restrictions, to get the TXT record.
934 6. All authenticators now have a server_condition option.
936 7. There is a new command-line option called -Mset. It is useful only in
937 conjunction with -be (that is, when testing string expansions). It must be
938 followed by a message id; Exim loads the given message from its spool
939 before doing the expansions.
941 8. Another similar new command-line option is called -bem. It operates like
942 -be except that it must be followed by the name of a file that contains a
945 9. When an address is delayed because of a 4xx response to a RCPT command, it
946 is now the combination of sender and recipient that is delayed in
947 subsequent queue runs until its retry time is reached.
949 10. Unary negation and the bitwise logical operators and, or, xor, not, and
950 shift, have been added to the eval: and eval10: expansion items.
952 11. The variables $interface_address and $interface_port have been renamed
953 as $received_ip_address and $received_port, to make it clear that they
954 relate to message reception rather than delivery. (The old names remain
955 available for compatibility.)
957 12. The "message" modifier can now be used on "accept" and "discard" acl verbs
958 to vary the message that is sent when an SMTP command is accepted.
964 1. There is a new Boolean option called filter_prepend_home for the redirect
967 2. There is a new acl, set by acl_not_smtp_start, which is run right at the
968 start of receiving a non-SMTP message, before any of the message has been
971 3. When an SMTP error message is specified in a "message" modifier in an ACL,
972 or in a :fail: or :defer: message in a redirect router, Exim now checks the
973 start of the message for an SMTP error code.
975 4. There is a new parameter for LDAP lookups called "referrals", which takes
976 one of the settings "follow" (the default) or "nofollow".
978 5. Version 20070721.2 of exipick now included, offering these new options:
980 After all other sorting options have bee processed, reverse order
981 before displaying messages (-R is synonym).
983 Randomize order of matching messages before displaying.
985 Instead of displaying the matching messages, display the sum
987 --sort <variable>[,<variable>...]
988 Before displaying matching messages, sort the messages according to
989 each messages value for each variable.
991 Negate the value for every test (returns inverse output from the
992 same criteria without --not).
998 1. The ${readsocket expansion item now supports Internet domain sockets as well
999 as Unix domain sockets. If the first argument begins "inet:", it must be of
1000 the form "inet:host:port". The port is mandatory; it may be a number or the
1001 name of a TCP port in /etc/services. The host may be a name, or it may be an
1002 IP address. An ip address may optionally be enclosed in square brackets.
1003 This is best for IPv6 addresses. For example:
1005 ${readsocket{inet:[::1]:1234}{<request data>}...
1007 Only a single host name may be given, but if looking it up yield more than
1008 one IP address, they are each tried in turn until a connection is made. Once
1009 a connection has been made, the behaviour is as for ${readsocket with a Unix
1012 2. If a redirect router sets up file or pipe deliveries for more than one
1013 incoming address, and the relevant transport has batch_max set greater than
1014 one, a batch delivery now occurs.
1016 3. The appendfile transport has a new option called maildirfolder_create_regex.
1017 Its value is a regular expression. For a maildir delivery, this is matched
1018 against the maildir directory; if it matches, Exim ensures that a
1019 maildirfolder file is created alongside the new, cur, and tmp directories.
1025 The documentation is up-to-date for the 4.61 release. Major new features since
1026 the 4.60 release are:
1028 . An option called disable_ipv6, to disable the use of IPv6 completely.
1030 . An increase in the number of ACL variables to 20 of each type.
1032 . A change to use $auth1, $auth2, and $auth3 in authenticators instead of $1,
1033 $2, $3, (though those are still set) because the numeric variables get used
1034 for other things in complicated expansions.
1036 . The default for rfc1413_query_timeout has been changed from 30s to 5s.
1038 . It is possible to use setclassresources() on some BSD OS to control the
1039 resources used in pipe deliveries.
1041 . A new ACL modifier called add_header, which can be used with any verb.
1043 . More errors are detectable in retry rules.
1045 There are a number of other additions too.
1051 The documentation is up-to-date for the 4.60 release. Major new features since
1052 the 4.50 release are:
1054 . Support for SQLite.
1056 . Support for IGNOREQUOTA in LMTP.
1058 . Extensions to the "submission mode" features.
1060 . Support for Client SMTP Authorization (CSA).
1062 . Support for ratelimiting hosts and users.
1064 . New expansion items to help with the BATV "prvs" scheme.
1066 . A "match_ip" condition, that matches an IP address against a list.
1068 There are many more minor changes.
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