Provided by: courier-mta_0.68.2-1ubuntu3_amd64 bug

NAME

       dot-courier - Local mail delivery instructions

SYNOPSIS

       $HOME/.courier

       $HOME/.courier-foo

       /etc/courier/aliasdir/.courier-foo

DESCRIPTION

       In most cases delivering mail to an account means simply placing the message in the
       account's system mailbox, but that does not have to be the case. Alternate mail delivery
       instructions include running a separate program to process the message, or forwarding the
       message to another address. The various .courier files specify some basic mail delivery
       instructions. If sophisticated mail filtering is required, the delivery instructions
       should include running an external mail filter, such as maildrop(1)[1].

       The file $HOME/.courier specifies how messages are delivered to this account. If this file
       does not exist, default instructions set by the system administrator are used. The system
       administrator's default instructions specify the location of the account's system mailbox.

       In addition to receiving mail addressed user@domain, it is also possible for user to
       receive mail addressed to user-foo@domain, for arbitrary values of foo. To do this,
       install $HOME/.courier-foo, with delivery instructions for mail addressed to
       user-foo@domain.

       The system administrator can configure the Courier mail server to accept mail without
       regard to whether addresses are in uppercase and lowercase. In that case the name of a
       .courier file must contain only lowercase characters. In any event, all periods in the
       address must be replaced with colons. For example, to specify delivery instructions for
       user-Foo.Bar@domain, put the delivery instructions in ~user/.courier-foo:bar.

       The file $HOME/.courier-foo-default specifies delivery instructions for any
       user-foo-bar@domain address, where bar can be anything. However, it does NOT control mail
       delivery to user-foo@domain, which is controlled by $HOME/.courier-foo.

       Possible mail delivery instructions include: whether each message should be delivered to a
       non-standard mailbox; forwarded to another E-mail address; or if another program should be
       executed to handle the message. Programs executed from a .courier file have access to some
       environment variables (see ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES). Programs executed from a -default file
       can read those environment variables to determine the exact E-mail address the message was
       delivered to.

   Default delivery instructions
       The /etc/courier/aliasdir directory is searched as the last resort, when all attempts to
       figure out how to deliver mail to a local address have failed.

       /etc/courier/aliasdir's functionality is very similar to how the alias account is
       implemented in Qmail, except that no actual system account is needed. If
       <user@example.com> is a local address, and there is no such system account, nor is there
       an alias defined for this address, the Courier mail server attempts to read delivery
       instructions from /etc/courier/aliasdir/.courier-user.

       All the usual aspects of .courier deliveries apply. If there is no account that
       corresponds to the address <user-foo@example.com>, the Courier mail server looks for
       /etc/courier/aliasdir/.courier-user-foo, then /etc/courier/aliasdir/.courier-user-default,
       and finally /etc/courier/aliasdir/.courier-default.

       It therefore follows that you can use /etc/courier/aliasdir/.courier-default to specify
       local mail delivery instructions for addresses that do not exist. Combined with dynamic
       mail delivery instructions (see below), that's one way to specify non-standard locations
       of mailboxes.

   Program/mailbox aliases
       The directory /etc/courier/aliasdir/.courier-:xalias/ is created and maintained by the
       makealiases(8)[2] script to implement aliases that deliver directly to programs or
       mailboxes. See makealiases(8)[2] for more information. (This directory corresponds to
       local addresses that begin with ".xalias/", but the Courier mail server prohibits explicit
       local addresses that begin with a period).

       Additionally, makealiases(8)[2] creates subdirectories named
       /etc/courier/aliasdir/.courier-:xalias-protocol/, where "protocol" is set by the -m
       option.

   DELIVERY INSTRUCTIONS
       Each .courier file specifies zero or more delivery instructions. If the .courier file is
       zero bytes long, it means that default mail delivery instructions set by the system
       administrator should be used. If the file is not a zero length file, and does not specify
       any delivery instructions, messages to the corresponding E-mail address are silently
       discarded.

           Note
           If $HOME/.courier does not exist, it is treated as a zero-length file, resulting in a
           delivery to a default mailbox. If $HOME/.courier-foo does not exist, it is treated as
           a non-existent address, returning the message as undeliverable.

       If home directories have global read and execute permissions, the Courier mail server will
       be able to reject mail to non-existent mailboxes right away. the Courier mail server's
       ESMTP server runs as a non-privileged process. It will not be able to access home
       directories which do not have global read and execute permissions. Therefore, the message
       will be accepted for delivery, by the Courier mail server. As soon as an attempt to
       deliver the message is made, the missing .courier file will result in the message being
       returned as undeliverable. However, here the Courier mail server has to accept the message
       for delivery first, before generating a non-delivery report.

       Delivery instructions in .courier are executed one at a time. If the execution of a
       delivery instruction fails for some reason, the message is either returned as
       undeliverable, or requeued for another delivery attempt. Messages that remain queued for a
       long period of time are returned as undeliverable.

           Note
           Even if one delivery instruction fails (and the message is returned as undeliverable)
           previous delivery instructions in the file will have been completed anyway.

       Blank lines in the file are ignored. Lines starting with the # character are comments, and
       are also ignored. Otherwise, each line specifies one of three possible delivery
       instructions: deliver to a system mailbox or a Maildir; run an external program; or
       forward the message to another address.

   DELIVERY TO A SYSTEM MAILBOX OR A MAILDIR
       Lines that start with the .  or the / character specify a mailbox or a Maildir delivery.
       The line must specify the complete location of the mailbox file, or a Maildir. Filenames
       starting with .  are relative to the account's home directory. A mailbox file is a
       traditional mailbox file that's readable by most mail software. A Maildir is a directory
       based mail storage format that offers several advantages over mailbox files. Mailbox files
       must be locked, and therefore they do not permit concurrent mail deliveries. The mailbox
       file must be locked while a new message is appended to it, otherwise multiple messages
       being delivered at the same time will trample all over each other. Maildirs do not require
       locking, and multiple concurrent deliveries can be made to the same Maildir. You can
       create Maildirs by using the maildirmake(1)[3] command.

           Note
           The Courier mail server does not implement the "dot-locking" form of mailbox file
           locking. The Courier mail server's locking abilities are limited solely to system file
           locking facilities (namely the lockf, or flock system calls). You can always use
           maildrop(1)[1], which offers additional locking options.

   RUNNING AN EXTERNAL PROGRAM
       Lines that begin with a single | character run an external program. The rest of the line
       specifies the command to be executed by the shell. Long commands can be continued on
       another line by terminating the previous line with the \ character.

       The Courier mail server runs the specified command, and provides the contents of the
       message on standard input.

       The Courier mail server waits until the external command completes execution before going
       to the next delivery instruction. The Courier mail server examines the exit code of the
       external command in order to determine whether the delivery failed, or not.

       If the external command terminates with the exit code of zero, the next delivery
       instruction is executed. If the command was the last delivery instruction in the file, the
       message is considered to be successfully delivered.

       If the external command terminates with the exit code of 99, any additional delivery
       instructions in the file are NOT executed, but the message is considered to be
       successfully delivered.

       If the external command terminates with any of the following exit codes: 64, 65, 67, 68,
       69, 70, 76, 77, 78, 100, or 112, the E-mail message will be returned as undeliverable, and
       no further delivery instructions will take place.

       If the external command terminates with any other exit code, it is interpreted as a
       temporary error, and the message will be requeued for another delivery attempt later.

           Note
           On subsequent delivery attempts, delivery instructions will be carried out from the
           beginning of the .courier file.

   DYNAMIC DELIVERY INSTRUCTIONS
       Lines that begin with the || characters also run an external program. The rest of the line
       specifies the command to be executed by the shell. Long commands can be continued on
       another line by terminating the previous line with the \ character.

       However, programs that are executed by the || instruction, unlike |, have their standard
       output captured, and reinterpreted as additional delivery instructions to be carried out.
       This feature allows an external program to be invoked to generate dynamic delivery
       instructions to be carried out by the Courier mail server.

       The standard output of the external program is read and parsed as if it contained .courier
       delivery instructions. There's a fixed upper limit on the number of bytes in
       dynamically-generated delivery instructions. For glibc, the limit is 8191 bytes, other
       systems's upper limit should be similar.

       The dynamically generated delivery instructions may also specify || instructions,
       recursively. There is an upper limit of four recursive dynamically-generated delivery
       instructions.

       The exit code of the program invoked by the || instructions are interpreted exactly like
       the exit code of a program invoked by |, with the following exceptions.
       Dynamically-generated delivery instructions are carried out only if the external program
       terminates with an exit code of 0 or 99. Any other exit code discards any
       dynamically-generated delivery instructions. All other aspects of exit code treatment of
       external programs remains the same. If the exit code is 99, the delivery is deemed to be
       successful, and any additional instructions in the original .courier file are ignored. If
       the exit code is 0, the remaining instructions in the original .courier file are executed.

   Alias-based deliveries
       When the Courier mail server delivers to default delivery instructions in
       /etc/courier/aliasdir, those delivery instructions are carried out under the Courier mail
       server's installed system user and group id. That means that any executed programs or
       mailboxes are accessed as the Courier mail server's mail system user and group.

   ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
       External commands executed from the .courier file will have the following environment
       variables:

       HOME
           The home directory.

       USER
           The recipient's userid.

       SENDER
           The message envelope return address.

       RECIPIENT
           The complete receipient address.

       HOST
           When RECIPIENT is of the form user@domain, HOST contains the domain part of the
           address.

       LOCAL
           When RECIPIENT is of the form user@domain, LOCAL contains the user part of the
           address.

       EXT
           When USER is of the form $USER-foobar, EXT will contain the foobar part.

       EXT2
           The portion of EXT that follows the first dash.

       EXT3
           The portion of EXT2 that follows the first dash.

       EXT4
           The portion of EXT3 that follows the first dash.

       DEFAULT
           When delivery instructions for the address user-foo-bar@domain come from the file
           $HOME/.courier-foo-default, DEFAULT will contain the bar part.

       UFLINE
           This environment variable contains the entire From_ header that should be prepended to
           the message if it is to be delivered to a mailbox.

       RPLINE
           This environment variable contains the entire Return-Path: header.

       DTLINE
           This environment variable contains the entire Delivered-To: header.

           Note
           When the external program reads the message from standard input, the message will NOT
           have the customary From_, Return-Path:, and Delivered-To: headers which are customary
           for locally-delivered messages. The external program can find those headers in the
           respective environment variables. If you have a command that expects to see those
           headers as a part of the message, you can use the preline(1)[4] wrapper to add them to
           the message. For example, the procmail mail filter requires those headers.

           Note
           The maildrop mail filter will not require preline if the system administrator
           correctly configures the Courier mail server. The system administrator can optionally
           configure the Courier mail server to recognize maildrop, and activate certain
           maildrop-specific optimizations in the Courier mail server. If these arrangemenets
           have been made, you can run maildrop directly from the .courier file, in a
           straightforward fashion, but those headers will automatically appear in the message,
           as seen by maildrop. Because the message is provided directly on standard input,
           without using a pipe, maildrop will be able to deliver the message directly from the
           Courier mail server's message queue, without using a temporary file.

   FORWARDING
       Lines that do not start with the ., /, or the | character specify a comma-separated list
       of E-mail addresses to forward the message to. If the line starts with either the & or the
       !  character, the character is ignored; this is a legacy compatibility option.

BUGS

       The Courier mail server's .courier may seem to be exactly like Qmail's .qmail, but there
       are some minor differences. Qmail, as of 1.03, does not implement dynamic delivery
       instructions. The Courier mail server also uses a slightly different set of return codes
       which are classified as hard errors. The Courier mail server's implementation of
       forwarding differs from Qmail's. According to Qmail's documentation, if any external
       command terminates in a permanent or temporary failure, the message is not forwarded to
       any forwarding address in the .qmail file, even to addresses that precede the failed
       delivery instruction. The message is forwarded only after it is successfully delivered.
       The Courier mail server forwards messages to addresses immediately. Also, in some cases
       Qmail resets the return address on the message to the address of the account being
       forwarded.

       To make things more confusing, there is a configuration setting to have the Courier mail
       server read $HOME/.qmail files, instead of $HOME/.courier.

SEE ALSO

       dot-forward(1)[5], maildirmake(1)[3], maildrop(1)[1], courier(8)[6].

AUTHOR

       Sam Varshavchik
           Author

NOTES

        1. maildrop(1)
           [set $man.base.url.for.relative.links]/maildrop.html

        2. makealiases(8)
           [set $man.base.url.for.relative.links]/makealiases.html

        3. maildirmake(1)
           [set $man.base.url.for.relative.links]/maildirmake.html

        4. preline(1)
           [set $man.base.url.for.relative.links]/preline.html

        5. dot-forward(1)
           [set $man.base.url.for.relative.links]/dot-forward.html

        6. courier(8)
           [set $man.base.url.for.relative.links]/courier.html