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 Git before the documentation is updated. Once
7 the documentation is updated, this file is reduced to a short list.
12 1. Dual-certificate stacks on servers now support OCSP stapling, under GnuTLS
13 version 3.5.6 or later.
15 2. DANE is now supported under GnuTLS version 3.0.0 or later. Both GnuTLS and
16 OpenSSL versions are moved to mainline support from Experimental.
18 3. Feature macros for the compiled-in set of malware scanner interfaces.
20 4. SPF support is promoted from Experimental to mainline status. The template
21 src/EDITME makefile does not enable its inclusion.
23 5. Logging control for DKIM verification. The existing DKIM log line is
24 controlled by a "dkim_verbose" selector which is _not_ enabled by default.
25 A new tag "DKIM=<domain>" is added to <= lines by default, controlled by
26 a "dkim" log_selector.
28 6. Receive duration on <= lines, under a new log_selector "receive_time".
30 7. Options "ipv4_only" and "ipv4_prefer" on the dnslookup router and on
31 routing rules in the manualroute router.
33 8. Expansion item ${sha3:<string>} / ${sha3_<N>:<string>} now also supported
34 under OpenSSL version 1.1.1 or later.
36 9. DKIM operations can now use the Ed25519 algorithm in addition to RSA, under
37 GnuTLS 3.6.0 or later.
39 10. Builtin feature-macros _CRYPTO_HASH_SHA3 and _CRYPTO_SIGN_ED25519, library
42 11. "exim -bP macro <name>" returns caller-usable status.
44 12. Expansion item ${authresults {<machine>}} for creating an
45 Authentication-Results: header.
47 13. EXPERIMENTAL_ARC. See the experimental.spec file.
53 1. PKG_CONFIG_PATH can now be set in Local/Makefile;
54 wildcards will be expanded, values are collapsed.
56 2. The ${readsocket } expansion now takes an option to not shutdown the
57 connection after sending the query string. The default remains to do so.
59 3. An smtp transport option "hosts_noproxy_tls" to control whether multiple
60 deliveries on a single TCP connection can maintain a TLS connection
61 open. By default disabled for all hosts, doing so saves the cost of
62 making new TLS sessions, at the cost of having to proxy the data via
63 another process. Logging is also affected.
65 4. A malware connection type for the FPSCAND protocol.
67 5. An option for recipient verify callouts to hold the connection open for
68 further recipients and for delivery.
70 6. The reproducible build $SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH environment variable is now
73 7. Optionally, an alternate format for spool data-files which matches the
74 wire format - meaning more efficient reception and transmission (at the
75 cost of difficulty with standard Unix tools). Only used for messages
76 received using the ESMTP CHUNKING option, and when a new main-section
77 option "spool_wireformat" (false by default) is set.
79 8. New main configuration option "commandline_checks_require_admin" to
80 restrict who can use various introspection options.
82 9. New option modifier "no_check" for quota and quota_filecount
85 10. Variable $smtp_command_history returning a comma-sep list of recent
88 11. Millisecond timetamps in logs, on log_selector "millisec". Also affects
89 log elements QT, DT and D, and timstamps in debug output.
91 12. TCP Fast Open logging. As a server, logs when the SMTP banner was sent
92 while still in SYN_RECV state; as a client logs when the connection
93 is opened with a TFO cookie.
95 13. DKIM support for multiple signing, by domain and/or key-selector.
96 DKIM support for multiple hashes, and for alternate-identity tags.
97 Builtin macro with default list of signed headers.
98 Better syntax for specifying oversigning.
99 The DKIM ACL can override verification status, and status is visible in
102 14. Exipick understands -C|--config for an alternative Exim
105 15. TCP Fast Open used, with data-on-SYN, for client SMTP via SOCKS5 proxy,
106 for ${readsocket } expansions, and for ClamAV.
108 16. The "-be" expansion test mode now supports macros. Macros are expanded
109 in test lines, and new macros can be defined.
111 17. Support for server-side dual-certificate-stacks (eg. RSA + ECDSA).
117 1. Allow relative config file names for ".include"
119 2. A main-section config option "debug_store" to control the checks on
120 variable locations during store-reset. Normally false but can be enabled
121 when a memory corrution issue is suspected on a production system.
127 1. The new perl_taintmode option allows to run the embedded perl
128 interpreter in taint mode.
130 2. New log_selector: dnssec, adds a "DS" tag to acceptance and delivery lines.
132 3. Speculative debugging, via a "kill" option to the "control=debug" ACL
135 4. New expansion item ${sha3:<string>} / ${sha3_<N>:<string>}.
136 N can be 224, 256 (default), 384, 512.
137 With GnuTLS 3.5.0 or later, only.
139 5. Facility for named queues: A command-line argument can specify
140 the queue name for a queue operation, and an ACL modifier can set
141 the queue to be used for a message. A $queue_name variable gives
144 6. New expansion operators base32/base32d.
146 7. The CHUNKING ESMTP extension from RFC 3030. May give some slight
147 performance increase and network load decrease. Main config option
148 chunking_advertise_hosts, and smtp transport option hosts_try_chunking
151 8. LMDB lookup support, as Experimental. Patch supplied by Andrew Colin Kissa.
153 9. Expansion operator escape8bit, like escape but not touching newline etc..
155 10. Feature macros, generated from compile options. All start with "_HAVE_"
156 and go on with some roughly recognisable name. Driver macros, for
157 router, transport and authentication drivers; names starting with "_DRIVER_".
158 Option macros, for each configuration-file option; all start with "_OPT_".
159 Use the "-bP macros" command-line option to see what is present.
161 11. Integer values for options can take a "G" multiplier.
163 12. defer=pass option for the ACL control cutthrough_delivery, to reflect 4xx
164 returns from the target back to the initiator, rather than spooling the
167 13. New built-in constants available for tls_dhparam and default changed.
169 14. If built with EXPERIMENTAL_QUEUEFILE, a queuefile transport, for writing
170 out copies of the message spool files for use by 3rd-party scanners.
172 15. A new option on the smtp transport, hosts_try_fastopen. If the system
173 supports it (on Linux it must be enabled in the kernel by the sysadmin)
174 try to use RFC 7413 "TCP Fast Open". No data is sent on the SYN segment
175 but it permits a peer that also supports the facility to send its SMTP
176 banner immediately after the SYN,ACK segment rather then waiting for
177 another ACK - so saving up to one roundtrip time. Because it requires
178 previous communication with the peer (we save a cookie from it) this
179 will only become active on frequently-contacted destinations.
181 16. A new syslog_pid option to suppress PID duplication in syslog lines.
187 1. The ACL conditions regex and mime_regex now capture substrings
188 into numeric variables $regex1 to 9, like the "match" expansion condition.
190 2. New $callout_address variable records the address used for a spam=,
191 malware= or verify= callout.
193 3. Transports now take a "max_parallel" option, to limit concurrency.
195 4. Expansion operators ${ipv6norm:<string>} and ${ipv6denorm:<string>}.
196 The latter expands to a 8-element colon-sep set of hex digits including
197 leading zeroes. A trailing ipv4-style dotted-decimal set is converted
198 to hex. Pure ipv4 addresses are converted to IPv4-mapped IPv6.
199 The former operator strips leading zeroes and collapses the longest
200 set of 0-groups to a double-colon.
202 5. New "-bP config" support, to dump the effective configuration.
204 6. New $dkim_key_length variable.
206 7. New base64d and base64 expansion items (the existing str2b64 being a
207 synonym of the latter). Add support in base64 for certificates.
209 8. New main configuration option "bounce_return_linesize_limit" to
210 avoid oversize bodies in bounces. The default value matches RFC
213 9. New $initial_cwd expansion variable.
219 1. Support for using the system standard CA bundle.
221 2. New expansion items $config_file, $config_dir, containing the file
222 and directory name of the main configuration file. Also $exim_version.
224 3. New "malware=" support for Avast.
226 4. New "spam=" variant option for Rspamd.
228 5. Assorted options on malware= and spam= scanners.
230 6. A command-line option to write a comment into the logfile.
232 7. If built with EXPERIMENTAL_SOCKS feature enabled, the smtp transport can
233 be configured to make connections via socks5 proxies.
235 8. If built with EXPERIMENTAL_INTERNATIONAL, support is included for
236 the transmission of UTF-8 envelope addresses.
238 9. If built with EXPERIMENTAL_INTERNATIONAL, an expansion item for a commonly
239 used encoding of Maildir folder names.
241 10. A logging option for slow DNS lookups.
243 11. New ${env {<variable>}} expansion.
245 12. A non-SMTP authenticator using information from TLS client certificates.
247 13. Main option "tls_eccurve" for selecting an Elliptic Curve for TLS.
248 Patch originally by Wolfgang Breyha.
250 14. Main option "dns_trust_aa" for trusting your local nameserver at the
251 same level as DNSSEC.
257 1. If built with EXPERIMENTAL_DANE feature enabled, Exim will follow the
258 DANE SMTP draft to assess a secure chain of trust of the certificate
259 used to establish the TLS connection based on a TLSA record in the
260 domain of the sender.
262 2. The EXPERIMENTAL_TPDA feature has been renamed to EXPERIMENTAL_EVENT
263 and several new events have been created. The reason is because it has
264 been expanded beyond just firing events during the transport phase. Any
265 existing TPDA transport options will have to be rewritten to use a new
266 $event_name expansion variable in a condition. Refer to the
267 experimental-spec.txt for details and examples.
269 3. The EXPERIMENTAL_CERTNAMES features is an enhancement to verify that
270 server certs used for TLS match the result of the MX lookup. It does
271 not use the same mechanism as DANE.
281 1. If built with the EXPERIMENTAL_PROXY feature enabled, Exim can be
282 configured to expect an initial header from a proxy that will make the
283 actual external source IP:host be used in exim instead of the IP of the
284 proxy that is connecting to it.
286 2. New verify option header_names_ascii, which will check to make sure
287 there are no non-ASCII characters in header names. Exim itself handles
288 those non-ASCII characters, but downstream apps may not, so Exim can
289 detect and reject if those characters are present.
291 3. New expansion operator ${utf8clean:string} to replace malformed UTF8
292 codepoints with valid ones.
294 4. New malware type "sock". Talks over a Unix or TCP socket, sending one
295 command line and matching a regex against the return data for trigger
296 and a second regex to extract malware_name. The mail spoolfile name can
297 be included in the command line.
299 5. The smtp transport now supports options "tls_verify_hosts" and
300 "tls_try_verify_hosts". If either is set the certificate verification
301 is split from the encryption operation. The default remains that a failed
302 verification cancels the encryption.
304 6. New SERVERS override of default ldap server list. In the ACLs, an ldap
305 lookup can now set a list of servers to use that is different from the
308 7. New command-line option -C for exiqgrep to specify alternate exim.conf
309 file when searching the queue.
311 8. OCSP now supports GnuTLS also, if you have version 3.1.3 or later of that.
313 9. Support for DNSSEC on outbound connections.
315 10. New variables "tls_(in,out)_(our,peer)cert" and expansion item
316 "certextract" to extract fields from them. Hash operators md5 and sha1
317 work over them for generating fingerprints, and a new sha256 operator
320 11. PRDR is now supported dy default.
322 12. OCSP stapling is now supported by default.
324 13. If built with the EXPERIMENTAL_DSN feature enabled, Exim will output
325 Delivery Status Notification messages in MIME format, and negotiate
326 DSN features per RFC 3461.
332 1. New command-line option -bI:sieve will list all supported sieve extensions
333 of this Exim build on standard output, one per line.
334 ManageSieve (RFC 5804) providers managing scripts for use by Exim should
335 query this to establish the correct list to include in the protocol's
336 SIEVE capability line.
338 2. If the -n option is combined with the -bP option, then the name of an
339 emitted option is not output, only the value (if visible to you).
340 For instance, "exim -n -bP pid_file_path" should just emit a pathname
341 followed by a newline, and no other text.
343 3. When built with SUPPORT_TLS and USE_GNUTLS, the SMTP transport driver now
344 has a "tls_dh_min_bits" option, to set the minimum acceptable number of
345 bits in the Diffie-Hellman prime offered by a server (in DH ciphersuites)
346 acceptable for security. (Option accepted but ignored if using OpenSSL).
347 Defaults to 1024, the old value. May be lowered only to 512, or raised as
348 far as you like. Raising this may hinder TLS interoperability with other
349 sites and is not currently recommended. Lowering this will permit you to
350 establish a TLS session which is not as secure as you might like.
352 Unless you really know what you are doing, leave it alone.
354 4. If not built with DISABLE_DNSSEC, Exim now has the main option
355 dns_dnssec_ok; if set to 1 then Exim will initialise the resolver library
356 to send the DO flag to your recursive resolver. If you have a recursive
357 resolver, which can set the Authenticated Data (AD) flag in results, Exim
358 can now detect this. Exim does not perform validation itself, instead
359 relying upon a trusted path to the resolver.
361 Current status: work-in-progress; $sender_host_dnssec variable added.
363 5. DSCP support for outbound connections: on a transport using the smtp driver,
364 set "dscp = ef", for instance, to cause the connections to have the relevant
365 DSCP (IPv4 TOS or IPv6 TCLASS) value in the header.
367 Similarly for inbound connections, there is a new control modifier, dscp,
368 so "warn control = dscp/ef" in the connect ACL, or after authentication.
370 Supported values depend upon system libraries. "exim -bI:dscp" to list the
371 ones Exim knows of. You can also set a raw number 0..0x3F.
373 6. The -G command-line flag is no longer ignored; it is now equivalent to an
374 ACL setting "control = suppress_local_fixups". The -L command-line flag
375 is now accepted and forces use of syslog, with the provided tag as the
376 process name. A few other flags used by Sendmail are now accepted and
379 7. New cutthrough routing feature. Requested by a "control = cutthrough_delivery"
380 ACL modifier; works for single-recipient mails which are received on and
381 deliverable via SMTP. Using the connection made for a recipient verify,
382 if requested before the verify, or a new one made for the purpose while
383 the inbound connection is still active. The bulk of the mail item is copied
384 direct from the inbound socket to the outbound (as well as the spool file).
385 When the source notifies the end of data, the data acceptance by the destination
386 is negotiated before the acceptance is sent to the source. If the destination
387 does not accept the mail item, for example due to content-scanning, the item
388 is not accepted from the source and therefore there is no need to generate
389 a bounce mail. This is of benefit when providing a secondary-MX service.
390 The downside is that delays are under the control of the ultimate destination
393 The Received-by: header on items delivered by cutthrough is generated
394 early in reception rather than at the end; this will affect any timestamp
395 included. The log line showing delivery is recorded before that showing
396 reception; it uses a new ">>" tag instead of "=>".
398 To support the feature, verify-callout connections can now use ESMTP and TLS.
399 The usual smtp transport options are honoured, plus a (new, default everything)
400 hosts_verify_avoid_tls.
402 New variable families named tls_in_cipher, tls_out_cipher etc. are introduced
403 for specific access to the information for each connection. The old names
404 are present for now but deprecated.
406 Not yet supported: IGNOREQUOTA, SIZE, PIPELINING.
408 8. New expansion operators ${listnamed:name} to get the content of a named list
409 and ${listcount:string} to count the items in a list.
411 9. New global option "gnutls_allow_auto_pkcs11", defaults false. The GnuTLS
412 rewrite in 4.80 combines with GnuTLS 2.12.0 or later, to autoload PKCS11
413 modules. For some situations this is desirable, but we expect admin in
414 those situations to know they want the feature. More commonly, it means
415 that GUI user modules get loaded and are broken by the setuid Exim being
416 unable to access files specified in environment variables and passed
417 through, thus breakage. So we explicitly inhibit the PKCS11 initialisation
418 unless this new option is set.
420 Some older OS's with earlier versions of GnuTLS might not have pkcs11 ability,
421 so have also added a build option which can be used to build Exim with GnuTLS
422 but without trying to use any kind of PKCS11 support. Uncomment this in the
425 AVOID_GNUTLS_PKCS11=yes
427 10. The "acl = name" condition on an ACL now supports optional arguments.
428 New expansion item "${acl {name}{arg}...}" and expansion condition
429 "acl {{name}{arg}...}" are added. In all cases up to nine arguments
430 can be used, appearing in $acl_arg1 to $acl_arg9 for the called ACL.
431 Variable $acl_narg contains the number of arguments. If the ACL sets
432 a "message =" value this becomes the result of the expansion item,
433 or the value of $value for the expansion condition. If the ACL returns
434 accept the expansion condition is true; if reject, false. A defer
435 return results in a forced fail.
437 11. Routers and transports can now have multiple headers_add and headers_remove
438 option lines. The concatenated list is used.
440 12. New ACL modifier "remove_header" can remove headers before message gets
441 handled by routers/transports.
443 13. New dnsdb lookup pseudo-type "a+". A sequence of "a6" (if configured),
444 "aaaa" and "a" lookups is done and the full set of results returned.
446 14. New expansion variable $headers_added with content from ACL add_header
447 modifier (but not yet added to message).
449 15. New 8bitmime status logging option for received messages. Log field "M8S".
451 16. New authenticated_sender logging option, adding to log field "A".
453 17. New expansion variables $router_name and $transport_name. Useful
454 particularly for debug_print as -bt command-line option does not
455 require privilege whereas -d does.
457 18. If built with EXPERIMENTAL_PRDR, per-recipient data responses per a
458 proposed extension to SMTP from Eric Hall.
460 19. The pipe transport has gained the force_command option, to allow
461 decorating commands from user .forward pipe aliases with prefix
462 wrappers, for instance.
464 20. Callout connections can now AUTH; the same controls as normal delivery
467 21. Support for DMARC, using opendmarc libs, can be enabled. It adds new
468 options: dmarc_forensic_sender, dmarc_history_file, and dmarc_tld_file.
469 It adds new expansion variables $dmarc_ar_header, $dmarc_status,
470 $dmarc_status_text, and $dmarc_used_domain. It adds a new acl modifier
471 dmarc_status. It adds new control flags dmarc_disable_verify and
472 dmarc_enable_forensic. The default for the dmarc_tld_file option is
473 "/etc/exim/opendmarc.tlds" and can be changed via EDITME.
475 22. Add expansion variable $authenticated_fail_id, which is the username
476 provided to the authentication method which failed. It is available
477 for use in subsequent ACL processing (typically quit or notquit ACLs).
479 23. New ACL modifier "udpsend" can construct a UDP packet to send to a given
482 24. New ${hexquote:..string..} expansion operator converts non-printable
483 characters in the string to \xNN form.
485 25. Experimental TPDA (Transport Post Delivery Action) function added.
486 Patch provided by Axel Rau.
488 26. Experimental Redis lookup added. Patch provided by Warren Baker.
494 1. New authenticator driver, "gsasl". Server-only (at present).
495 This is a SASL interface, licensed under GPL, which can be found at
496 http://www.gnu.org/software/gsasl/.
497 This system does not provide sources of data for authentication, so
498 careful use needs to be made of the conditions in Exim.
500 2. New authenticator driver, "heimdal_gssapi". Server-only.
501 A replacement for using cyrus_sasl with Heimdal, now that $KRB5_KTNAME
502 is no longer honoured for setuid programs by Heimdal. Use the
503 "server_keytab" option to point to the keytab.
505 3. The "pkg-config" system can now be used when building Exim to reference
506 cflags and library information for lookups and authenticators, rather
507 than having to update "CFLAGS", "AUTH_LIBS", "LOOKUP_INCLUDE" and
508 "LOOKUP_LIBS" directly. Similarly for handling the TLS library support
509 without adjusting "TLS_INCLUDE" and "TLS_LIBS".
511 In addition, setting PCRE_CONFIG=yes will query the pcre-config tool to
512 find the headers and libraries for PCRE.
514 4. New expansion variable $tls_bits.
516 5. New lookup type, "dbmjz". Key is an Exim list, the elements of which will
517 be joined together with ASCII NUL characters to construct the key to pass
518 into the DBM library. Can be used with gsasl to access sasldb2 files as
521 6. OpenSSL now supports TLS1.1 and TLS1.2 with OpenSSL 1.0.1.
523 Avoid release 1.0.1a if you can. Note that the default value of
524 "openssl_options" is no longer "+dont_insert_empty_fragments", as that
525 increased susceptibility to attack. This may still have interoperability
526 implications for very old clients (see version 4.31 change 37) but
527 administrators can choose to make the trade-off themselves and restore
528 compatibility at the cost of session security.
530 7. Use of the new expansion variable $tls_sni in the main configuration option
531 tls_certificate will cause Exim to re-expand the option, if the client
532 sends the TLS Server Name Indication extension, to permit choosing a
533 different certificate; tls_privatekey will also be re-expanded. You must
534 still set these options to expand to valid files when $tls_sni is not set.
536 The SMTP Transport has gained the option tls_sni, which will set a hostname
537 for outbound TLS sessions, and set $tls_sni too.
539 A new log_selector, +tls_sni, has been added, to log received SNI values
540 for Exim as a server.
542 8. The existing "accept_8bitmime" option now defaults to true. This means
543 that Exim is deliberately not strictly RFC compliant. We're following
544 Dan Bernstein's advice in http://cr.yp.to/smtp/8bitmime.html by default.
545 Those who disagree, or know that they are talking to mail servers that,
546 even today, are not 8-bit clean, need to turn off this option.
548 9. Exim can now be started with -bw (with an optional timeout, given as
549 -bw<timespec>). With this, stdin at startup is a socket that is
550 already listening for connections. This has a more modern name of
551 "socket activation", but forcing the activated socket to fd 0. We're
552 interested in adding more support for modern variants.
554 10. ${eval } now uses 64-bit values on supporting platforms. A new "G" suffix
555 for numbers indicates multiplication by 1024^3.
557 11. The GnuTLS support has been revamped; the three options gnutls_require_kx,
558 gnutls_require_mac & gnutls_require_protocols are no longer supported.
559 tls_require_ciphers is now parsed by gnutls_priority_init(3) as a priority
560 string, documentation for which is at:
561 http://www.gnutls.org/manual/html_node/Priority-Strings.html
563 SNI support has been added to Exim's GnuTLS integration too.
565 For sufficiently recent GnuTLS libraries, ${randint:..} will now use
566 gnutls_rnd(), asking for GNUTLS_RND_NONCE level randomness.
568 12. With OpenSSL, if built with EXPERIMENTAL_OCSP, a new option tls_ocsp_file
569 is now available. If the contents of the file are valid, then Exim will
570 send that back in response to a TLS status request; this is OCSP Stapling.
571 Exim will not maintain the contents of the file in any way: administrators
572 are responsible for ensuring that it is up-to-date.
574 See "experimental-spec.txt" for more details.
576 13. ${lookup dnsdb{ }} supports now SPF record types. They are handled
577 identically to TXT record lookups.
579 14. New expansion variable $tod_epoch_l for higher-precision time.
581 15. New global option tls_dh_max_bits, defaulting to current value of NSS
582 hard-coded limit of DH ephemeral bits, to fix interop problems caused by
583 GnuTLS 2.12 library recommending a bit count higher than NSS supports.
585 16. tls_dhparam now used by both OpenSSL and GnuTLS, can be path or identifier.
586 Option can now be a path or an identifier for a standard prime.
587 If unset, we use the DH prime from section 2.2 of RFC 5114, "ike23".
588 Set to "historic" to get the old GnuTLS behaviour of auto-generated DH
591 17. SSLv2 now disabled by default in OpenSSL. (Never supported by GnuTLS).
592 Use "openssl_options -no_sslv2" to re-enable support, if your OpenSSL
593 install was not built with OPENSSL_NO_SSL2 ("no-ssl2").
599 1. New options for the ratelimit ACL condition: /count= and /unique=.
600 The /noupdate option has been replaced by a /readonly option.
602 2. The SMTP transport's protocol option may now be set to "smtps", to
603 use SSL-on-connect outbound.
605 3. New variable $av_failed, set true if the AV scanner deferred; ie, when
606 there is a problem talking to the AV scanner, or the AV scanner running.
608 4. New expansion conditions, "inlist" and "inlisti", which take simple lists
609 and check if the search item is a member of the list. This does not
610 support named lists, but does subject the list part to string expansion.
612 5. Unless the new EXPAND_LISTMATCH_RHS build option is set when Exim was
613 built, Exim no longer performs string expansion on the second string of
614 the match_* expansion conditions: "match_address", "match_domain",
615 "match_ip" & "match_local_part". Named lists can still be used.
621 1. The global option "dns_use_edns0" may be set to coerce EDNS0 usage on
622 or off in the resolver library.
628 1. In addition to the existing LDAP and LDAP/SSL ("ldaps") support, there
629 is now LDAP/TLS support, given sufficiently modern OpenLDAP client
630 libraries. The following global options have been added in support of
631 this: ldap_ca_cert_dir, ldap_ca_cert_file, ldap_cert_file, ldap_cert_key,
632 ldap_cipher_suite, ldap_require_cert, ldap_start_tls.
634 2. The pipe transport now takes a boolean option, "freeze_signal", default
635 false. When true, if the external delivery command exits on a signal then
636 Exim will freeze the message in the queue, instead of generating a bounce.
638 3. Log filenames may now use %M as an escape, instead of %D (still available).
639 The %M pattern expands to yyyymm, providing month-level resolution.
641 4. The $message_linecount variable is now updated for the maildir_tag option,
642 in the same way as $message_size, to reflect the real number of lines,
643 including any header additions or removals from transport.
645 5. When contacting a pool of SpamAssassin servers configured in spamd_address,
646 Exim now selects entries randomly, to better scale in a cluster setup.
652 1. SECURITY FIX: privilege escalation flaw fixed. On Linux (and only Linux)
653 the flaw permitted the Exim run-time user to cause root to append to
654 arbitrary files of the attacker's choosing, with the content based
655 on content supplied by the attacker.
657 2. Exim now supports loading some lookup types at run-time, using your
658 platform's dlopen() functionality. This has limited platform support
659 and the intention is not to support every variant, it's limited to
660 dlopen(). This permits the main Exim binary to not be linked against
661 all the libraries needed for all the lookup types.
667 NOTE: this version is not guaranteed backwards-compatible, please read the
668 items below carefully
670 1. A new main configuration option, "openssl_options", is available if Exim
671 is built with SSL support provided by OpenSSL. The option allows
672 administrators to specify OpenSSL options to be used on connections;
673 typically this is to set bug compatibility features which the OpenSSL
674 developers have not enabled by default. There may be security
675 consequences for certain options, so these should not be changed
678 2. A new pipe transport option, "permit_coredumps", may help with problem
679 diagnosis in some scenarios. Note that Exim is typically installed as
680 a setuid binary, which on most OSes will inhibit coredumps by default,
681 so that safety mechanism would have to be overridden for this option to
682 be able to take effect.
684 3. ClamAV 0.95 is now required for ClamAV support in Exim, unless
685 Local/Makefile sets: WITH_OLD_CLAMAV_STREAM=yes
686 Note that this switches Exim to use a new API ("INSTREAM") and a future
687 release of ClamAV will remove support for the old API ("STREAM").
689 The av_scanner option, when set to "clamd", now takes an optional third
690 part, "local", which causes Exim to pass a filename to ClamAV instead of
691 the file content. This is the same behaviour as when clamd is pointed at
692 a Unix-domain socket. For example:
694 av_scanner = clamd:192.0.2.3 1234:local
696 ClamAV's ExtendedDetectionInfo response format is now handled.
698 4. There is now a -bmalware option, restricted to admin users. This option
699 takes one parameter, a filename, and scans that file with Exim's
700 malware-scanning framework. This is intended purely as a debugging aid
701 to ensure that Exim's scanning is working, not to replace other tools.
702 Note that the ACL framework is not invoked, so if av_scanner references
703 ACL variables without a fallback then this will fail.
705 5. There is a new expansion operator, "reverse_ip", which will reverse IP
706 addresses; IPv4 into dotted quad, IPv6 into dotted nibble. Examples:
708 ${reverse_ip:192.0.2.4}
710 ${reverse_ip:2001:0db8:c42:9:1:abcd:192.0.2.3}
711 -> 3.0.2.0.0.0.0.c.d.c.b.a.1.0.0.0.9.0.0.0.2.4.c.0.8.b.d.0.1.0.0.2
713 6. There is a new ACL control called "debug", to enable debug logging.
714 This allows selective logging of certain incoming transactions within
715 production environments, with some care. It takes two options, "tag"
716 and "opts"; "tag" is included in the filename of the log and "opts"
717 is used as per the -d<options> command-line option. Examples, which
718 don't all make sense in all contexts:
721 control = debug/tag=.$sender_host_address
722 control = debug/opts=+expand+acl
723 control = debug/tag=.$message_exim_id/opts=+expand
725 7. It has always been implicit in the design and the documentation that
726 "the Exim user" is not root. src/EDITME said that using root was
727 "very strongly discouraged". This is not enough to keep people from
728 shooting themselves in the foot in days when many don't configure Exim
729 themselves but via package build managers. The security consequences of
730 running various bits of network code are severe if there should be bugs in
731 them. As such, the Exim user may no longer be root. If configured
732 statically, Exim will refuse to build. If configured as ref:user then Exim
733 will exit shortly after start-up. If you must shoot yourself in the foot,
734 then henceforth you will have to maintain your own local patches to strip
737 8. There is a new expansion condition, bool_lax{}. Where bool{} uses the ACL
738 condition logic to determine truth/failure and will fail to expand many
739 strings, bool_lax{} uses the router condition logic, where most strings
741 Note: bool{00} is false, bool_lax{00} is true.
743 9. Routers now support multiple "condition" tests.
745 10. There is now a runtime configuration option "tcp_wrappers_daemon_name".
746 Setting this allows an admin to define which entry in the tcpwrappers
747 config file will be used to control access to the daemon. This option
748 is only available when Exim is built with USE_TCP_WRAPPERS. The
749 default value is set at build time using the TCP_WRAPPERS_DAEMON_NAME
752 11. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] The default value for system_filter_user is now
753 the Exim run-time user, instead of root.
755 12. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] ALT_CONFIG_ROOT_ONLY is no longer optional and
756 is forced on. This is mitigated by the new build option
757 TRUSTED_CONFIG_LIST which defines a list of configuration files which
758 are trusted; one per line. If a config file is owned by root and matches
759 a pathname in the list, then it may be invoked by the Exim build-time
760 user without Exim relinquishing root privileges.
762 13. [POSSIBLE CONFIG BREAKAGE] The Exim user is no longer automatically
763 trusted to supply -D<Macro[=Value]> overrides on the command-line. Going
764 forward, we recommend using TRUSTED_CONFIG_LIST with shim configs that
765 include the main config. As a transition mechanism, we are temporarily
766 providing a work-around: the new build option WHITELIST_D_MACROS provides
767 a colon-separated list of macro names which may be overridden by the Exim
768 run-time user. The values of these macros are constrained to the regex
769 ^[A-Za-z0-9_/.-]*$ (which explicitly does allow for empty values).
775 1. TWO SECURITY FIXES: one relating to mail-spools which are globally
776 writable, the other to locking of MBX folders (not mbox).
778 2. MySQL stored procedures are now supported.
780 3. The dkim_domain transport option is now a list, not a single string, and
781 messages will be signed for each element in the list (discarding
784 4. The 4.70 release unexpectedly changed the behaviour of dnsdb TXT lookups
785 in the presence of multiple character strings within the RR. Prior to 4.70,
786 only the first string would be returned. The dnsdb lookup now, by default,
787 preserves the pre-4.70 semantics, but also now takes an extended output
788 separator specification. The separator can be followed by a semicolon, to
789 concatenate the individual text strings together with no join character,
790 or by a comma and a second separator character, in which case the text
791 strings within a TXT record are joined on that second character.
792 Administrators are reminded that DNS provides no ordering guarantees
793 between multiple records in an RRset. For example:
795 foo.example. IN TXT "a" "b" "c"
796 foo.example. IN TXT "d" "e" "f"
798 ${lookup dnsdb{>/ txt=foo.example}} -> "a/d"
799 ${lookup dnsdb{>/; txt=foo.example}} -> "def/abc"
800 ${lookup dnsdb{>/,+ txt=foo.example}} -> "a+b+c/d+e+f"
806 1. Native DKIM support without an external library.
807 (Note that if no action to prevent it is taken, a straight upgrade will
808 result in DKIM verification of all signed incoming emails. See spec
809 for details on conditionally disabling)
811 2. Experimental DCC support via dccifd (contributed by Wolfgang Breyha).
813 3. There is now a bool{} expansion condition which maps certain strings to
814 true/false condition values (most likely of use in conjunction with the
815 and{} expansion operator).
817 4. The $spam_score, $spam_bar and $spam_report variables are now available
820 5. exim -bP now supports "macros", "macro_list" or "macro MACRO_NAME" as
821 options, provided that Exim is invoked by an admin_user.
823 6. There is a new option gnutls_compat_mode, when linked against GnuTLS,
824 which increases compatibility with older clients at the cost of decreased
825 security. Don't set this unless you need to support such clients.
827 7. There is a new expansion operator, ${randint:...} which will produce a
828 "random" number less than the supplied integer. This randomness is
829 not guaranteed to be cryptographically strong, but depending upon how
830 Exim was built may be better than the most naive schemes.
832 8. Exim now explicitly ensures that SHA256 is available when linked against
835 9. The transport_filter_timeout option now applies to SMTP transports too.
841 1. Preliminary DKIM support in Experimental.
847 1. The body_linecount and body_zerocount C variables are now exported in the
850 2. When a dnslists lookup succeeds, the key that was looked up is now placed
851 in $dnslist_matched. When the key is an IP address, it is not reversed in
852 this variable (though it is, of course, in the actual lookup). In simple
855 deny dnslists = spamhaus.example
857 the key is also available in another variable (in this case,
858 $sender_host_address). In more complicated cases, however, this is not
859 true. For example, using a data lookup might generate a dnslists lookup
862 deny dnslists = spamhaus.example/<|192.168.1.2|192.168.6.7|...
864 If this condition succeeds, the value in $dnslist_matched might be
865 192.168.6.7 (for example).
867 3. Authenticators now have a client_condition option. When Exim is running as
868 a client, it skips an authenticator whose client_condition expansion yields
869 "0", "no", or "false". This can be used, for example, to skip plain text
870 authenticators when the connection is not encrypted by a setting such as:
872 client_condition = ${if !eq{$tls_cipher}{}}
874 Note that the 4.67 documentation states that $tls_cipher contains the
875 cipher used for incoming messages. In fact, during SMTP delivery, it
876 contains the cipher used for the delivery. The same is true for
879 4. There is now a -Mvc <message-id> option, which outputs a copy of the
880 message to the standard output, in RFC 2822 format. The option can be used
881 only by an admin user.
883 5. There is now a /noupdate option for the ratelimit ACL condition. It
884 computes the rate and checks the limit as normal, but it does not update
885 the saved data. This means that, in relevant ACLs, it is possible to lookup
886 the existence of a specified (or auto-generated) ratelimit key without
887 incrementing the ratelimit counter for that key.
889 In order for this to be useful, another ACL entry must set the rate
890 for the same key somewhere (otherwise it will always be zero).
895 # Read the rate; if it doesn't exist or is below the maximum
897 deny ratelimit = 100 / 5m / strict / noupdate
898 log_message = RATE: $sender_rate / $sender_rate_period \
899 (max $sender_rate_limit)
901 [... some other logic and tests...]
903 warn ratelimit = 100 / 5m / strict / per_cmd
904 log_message = RATE UPDATE: $sender_rate / $sender_rate_period \
905 (max $sender_rate_limit)
906 condition = ${if le{$sender_rate}{$sender_rate_limit}}
910 6. The variable $max_received_linelength contains the number of bytes in the
911 longest line that was received as part of the message, not counting the
912 line termination character(s).
914 7. Host lists can now include +ignore_defer and +include_defer, analagous to
915 +ignore_unknown and +include_unknown. These options should be used with
916 care, probably only in non-critical host lists such as whitelists.
918 8. There's a new option called queue_only_load_latch, which defaults true.
919 If set false when queue_only_load is greater than zero, Exim re-evaluates
920 the load for each incoming message in an SMTP session. Otherwise, once one
921 message is queued, the remainder are also.
923 9. There is a new ACL, specified by acl_smtp_notquit, which is run in most
924 cases when an SMTP session ends without sending QUIT. However, when Exim
925 itself is is bad trouble, such as being unable to write to its log files,
926 this ACL is not run, because it might try to do things (such as write to
927 log files) that make the situation even worse.
929 Like the QUIT ACL, this new ACL is provided to make it possible to gather
930 statistics. Whatever it returns (accept or deny) is immaterial. The "delay"
931 modifier is forbidden in this ACL.
933 When the NOTQUIT ACL is running, the variable $smtp_notquit_reason is set
934 to a string that indicates the reason for the termination of the SMTP
935 connection. The possible values are:
937 acl-drop Another ACL issued a "drop" command
938 bad-commands Too many unknown or non-mail commands
939 command-timeout Timeout while reading SMTP commands
940 connection-lost The SMTP connection has been lost
941 data-timeout Timeout while reading message data
942 local-scan-error The local_scan() function crashed
943 local-scan-timeout The local_scan() function timed out
944 signal-exit SIGTERM or SIGINT
945 synchronization-error SMTP synchronization error
946 tls-failed TLS failed to start
948 In most cases when an SMTP connection is closed without having received
949 QUIT, Exim sends an SMTP response message before actually closing the
950 connection. With the exception of acl-drop, the default message can be
951 overridden by the "message" modifier in the NOTQUIT ACL. In the case of a
952 "drop" verb in another ACL, it is the message from the other ACL that is
955 10. For MySQL and PostgreSQL lookups, it is now possible to specify a list of
956 servers with individual queries. This is done by starting the query with
957 "servers=x:y:z;", where each item in the list may take one of two forms:
959 (1) If it is just a host name, the appropriate global option (mysql_servers
960 or pgsql_servers) is searched for a host of the same name, and the
961 remaining parameters (database, user, password) are taken from there.
963 (2) If it contains any slashes, it is taken as a complete parameter set.
965 The list of servers is used in exactly the same was as the global list.
966 Once a connection to a server has happened and a query has been
967 successfully executed, processing of the lookup ceases.
969 This feature is intended for use in master/slave situations where updates
970 are occurring, and one wants to update a master rather than a slave. If the
971 masters are in the list for reading, you might have:
973 mysql_servers = slave1/db/name/pw:slave2/db/name/pw:master/db/name/pw
975 In an updating lookup, you could then write
977 ${lookup mysql{servers=master; UPDATE ...}
979 If, on the other hand, the master is not to be used for reading lookups:
981 pgsql_servers = slave1/db/name/pw:slave2/db/name/pw
983 you can still update the master by
985 ${lookup pgsql{servers=master/db/name/pw; UPDATE ...}
987 11. The message_body_newlines option (default FALSE, for backwards
988 compatibility) can be used to control whether newlines are present in
989 $message_body and $message_body_end. If it is FALSE, they are replaced by
996 1. There is a new log selector called smtp_no_mail, which is not included in
997 the default setting. When it is set, a line is written to the main log
998 whenever an accepted SMTP connection terminates without having issued a
1001 2. When an item in a dnslists list is followed by = and & and a list of IP
1002 addresses, the behaviour was not clear when the lookup returned more than
1003 one IP address. This has been solved by the addition of == and =& for "all"
1004 rather than the default "any" matching.
1006 3. Up till now, the only control over which cipher suites GnuTLS uses has been
1007 for the cipher algorithms. New options have been added to allow some of the
1008 other parameters to be varied.
1010 4. There is a new compile-time option called ENABLE_DISABLE_FSYNC. When it is
1011 set, Exim compiles a runtime option called disable_fsync.
1013 5. There is a new variable called $smtp_count_at_connection_start.
1015 6. There's a new control called no_pipelining.
1017 7. There are two new variables called $sending_ip_address and $sending_port.
1018 These are set whenever an SMTP connection to another host has been set up.
1020 8. The expansion of the helo_data option in the smtp transport now happens
1021 after the connection to the server has been made.
1023 9. There is a new expansion operator ${rfc2047d: that decodes strings that
1024 are encoded as per RFC 2047.
1026 10. There is a new log selector called "pid", which causes the current process
1027 id to be added to every log line, in square brackets, immediately after the
1030 11. Exim has been modified so that it flushes SMTP output before implementing
1031 a delay in an ACL. It also flushes the output before performing a callout,
1032 as this can take a substantial time. These behaviours can be disabled by
1033 obeying control = no_delay_flush or control = no_callout_flush,
1034 respectively, at some earlier stage of the connection.
1036 12. There are two new expansion conditions that iterate over a list. They are
1037 called forany and forall.
1039 13. There's a new global option called dsn_from that can be used to vary the
1040 contents of From: lines in bounces and other automatically generated
1041 messages ("delivery status notifications" - hence the name of the option).
1043 14. The smtp transport has a new option called hosts_avoid_pipelining.
1045 15. By default, exigrep does case-insensitive matches. There is now a -I option
1046 that makes it case-sensitive.
1048 16. A number of new features ("addresses", "map", "filter", and "reduce") have
1049 been added to string expansions to make it easier to process lists of
1050 items, typically addresses.
1052 17. There's a new ACL modifier called "continue". It does nothing of itself,
1053 and processing of the ACL always continues with the next condition or
1054 modifier. It is provided so that the side effects of expanding its argument
1057 18. It is now possible to use newline and other control characters (those with
1058 values less than 32, plus DEL) as separators in lists.
1060 19. The exigrep utility now has a -v option, which inverts the matching
1063 20. The host_find_failed option in the manualroute router can now be set to
1070 No new features were added to 4.66.
1076 No new features were added to 4.65.
1082 1. ACL variables can now be given arbitrary names, as long as they start with
1083 "acl_c" or "acl_m" (for connection variables and message variables), are at
1084 least six characters long, with the sixth character being either a digit or
1087 2. There is a new ACL modifier called log_reject_target. It makes it possible
1088 to specify which logs are used for messages about ACL rejections.
1090 3. There is a new authenticator called "dovecot". This is an interface to the
1091 authentication facility of the Dovecot POP/IMAP server, which can support a
1092 number of authentication methods.
1094 4. The variable $message_headers_raw provides a concatenation of all the
1095 messages's headers without any decoding. This is in contrast to
1096 $message_headers, which does RFC2047 decoding on the header contents.
1098 5. In a DNS black list, if two domain names, comma-separated, are given, the
1099 second is used first to do an initial check, making use of any IP value
1100 restrictions that are set. If there is a match, the first domain is used,
1101 without any IP value restrictions, to get the TXT record.
1103 6. All authenticators now have a server_condition option.
1105 7. There is a new command-line option called -Mset. It is useful only in
1106 conjunction with -be (that is, when testing string expansions). It must be
1107 followed by a message id; Exim loads the given message from its spool
1108 before doing the expansions.
1110 8. Another similar new command-line option is called -bem. It operates like
1111 -be except that it must be followed by the name of a file that contains a
1114 9. When an address is delayed because of a 4xx response to a RCPT command, it
1115 is now the combination of sender and recipient that is delayed in
1116 subsequent queue runs until its retry time is reached.
1118 10. Unary negation and the bitwise logical operators and, or, xor, not, and
1119 shift, have been added to the eval: and eval10: expansion items.
1121 11. The variables $interface_address and $interface_port have been renamed
1122 as $received_ip_address and $received_port, to make it clear that they
1123 relate to message reception rather than delivery. (The old names remain
1124 available for compatibility.)
1126 12. The "message" modifier can now be used on "accept" and "discard" acl verbs
1127 to vary the message that is sent when an SMTP command is accepted.
1133 1. There is a new Boolean option called filter_prepend_home for the redirect
1136 2. There is a new acl, set by acl_not_smtp_start, which is run right at the
1137 start of receiving a non-SMTP message, before any of the message has been
1140 3. When an SMTP error message is specified in a "message" modifier in an ACL,
1141 or in a :fail: or :defer: message in a redirect router, Exim now checks the
1142 start of the message for an SMTP error code.
1144 4. There is a new parameter for LDAP lookups called "referrals", which takes
1145 one of the settings "follow" (the default) or "nofollow".
1147 5. Version 20070721.2 of exipick now included, offering these new options:
1149 After all other sorting options have bee processed, reverse order
1150 before displaying messages (-R is synonym).
1152 Randomize order of matching messages before displaying.
1154 Instead of displaying the matching messages, display the sum
1156 --sort <variable>[,<variable>...]
1157 Before displaying matching messages, sort the messages according to
1158 each messages value for each variable.
1160 Negate the value for every test (returns inverse output from the
1161 same criteria without --not).
1167 1. The ${readsocket expansion item now supports Internet domain sockets as well
1168 as Unix domain sockets. If the first argument begins "inet:", it must be of
1169 the form "inet:host:port". The port is mandatory; it may be a number or the
1170 name of a TCP port in /etc/services. The host may be a name, or it may be an
1171 IP address. An ip address may optionally be enclosed in square brackets.
1172 This is best for IPv6 addresses. For example:
1174 ${readsocket{inet:[::1]:1234}{<request data>}...
1176 Only a single host name may be given, but if looking it up yield more than
1177 one IP address, they are each tried in turn until a connection is made. Once
1178 a connection has been made, the behaviour is as for ${readsocket with a Unix
1181 2. If a redirect router sets up file or pipe deliveries for more than one
1182 incoming address, and the relevant transport has batch_max set greater than
1183 one, a batch delivery now occurs.
1185 3. The appendfile transport has a new option called maildirfolder_create_regex.
1186 Its value is a regular expression. For a maildir delivery, this is matched
1187 against the maildir directory; if it matches, Exim ensures that a
1188 maildirfolder file is created alongside the new, cur, and tmp directories.
1194 The documentation is up-to-date for the 4.61 release. Major new features since
1195 the 4.60 release are:
1197 . An option called disable_ipv6, to disable the use of IPv6 completely.
1199 . An increase in the number of ACL variables to 20 of each type.
1201 . A change to use $auth1, $auth2, and $auth3 in authenticators instead of $1,
1202 $2, $3, (though those are still set) because the numeric variables get used
1203 for other things in complicated expansions.
1205 . The default for rfc1413_query_timeout has been changed from 30s to 5s.
1207 . It is possible to use setclassresources() on some BSD OS to control the
1208 resources used in pipe deliveries.
1210 . A new ACL modifier called add_header, which can be used with any verb.
1212 . More errors are detectable in retry rules.
1214 There are a number of other additions too.
1220 The documentation is up-to-date for the 4.60 release. Major new features since
1221 the 4.50 release are:
1223 . Support for SQLite.
1225 . Support for IGNOREQUOTA in LMTP.
1227 . Extensions to the "submission mode" features.
1229 . Support for Client SMTP Authorization (CSA).
1231 . Support for ratelimiting hosts and users.
1233 . New expansion items to help with the BATV "prvs" scheme.
1235 . A "match_ip" condition, that matches an IP address against a list.
1237 There are many more minor changes.
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