the mail trail...sendmail

[Paul Howarth]

On Mon, 2005-03-28 at 15:53 +0100, Sean O Sullivan wrote:
> rado wrote:
> 
> >hi Y'all,
> >Oh, I am guilty of running programs that I don't know exactly what
> >they/their job is in the total process.
> >I'm talking about the mail system I have set up.
> >I just have a basic sendmail/procmail/evolution pop setup.
> >I want to know exactly what sendmail's job is. The man sendmail page
> >says it's job is to sendmail, as the name implies. Please tell me if my
> >thinking is warped. I think sendmail sends the mail in both directions.
> >you write a msg, it goes to sendmail and it gets sent on the way. 
> >a msg comes in sendmail is listening on, think it's port 25. sendmail
> >grabs it and.....
> >  
> >
> Sendmail sends mail & receives mail on port 25, as you have said.
> It also handles delivery of mail (i.e. puts new mail in /var/spool/user)

Actually sendmail uses another program (the default in FC being
procmail) to handle local delivery. Sendmail runs the program it's
configured to use for local delivery to put the file
in /var/spool/mail/user or wherever (e.g. it will be different for
someone using the cyrus mail system).

Paul.
-- 
Paul Howarth <paul at city-fan.org>