Provided by: postfix_3.1.0-3ubuntu0.4_amd64 bug

NAME

       postalias - Postfix alias database maintenance

SYNOPSIS

       postalias [-Nfinoprsuvw] [-c config_dir] [-d key] [-q key]
               [file_type:]file_name ...

DESCRIPTION

       The  postalias(1)  command creates or queries one or more Postfix alias databases, or updates an existing
       one. The input and output file formats are expected to be compatible with Sendmail  version  8,  and  are
       expected to be suitable for the use as NIS alias maps.

       If  the  result files do not exist they will be created with the same group and other read permissions as
       their source file.

       While a database update is in progress, signal delivery is postponed, and an exclusive, advisory, lock is
       placed on the entire database, in order to avoid surprises in spectator processes.

       The format of Postfix alias input files is described in aliases(5).

       By  default the lookup key is mapped to lowercase to make the lookups case insensitive; as of Postfix 2.3
       this case folding happens only with tables whose lookup keys are fixed-case strings such as btree:,  dbm:
       or hash:. With earlier versions, the lookup key is folded even with tables where a lookup field can match
       both upper and lower case text, such as regexp: and pcre:. This resulted  in  loss  of  information  with
       $number substitutions.

       Options:

       -c config_dir
              Read  the  main.cf  configuration file in the named directory instead of the default configuration
              directory.

       -d key Search the specified maps for key and remove one entry per map.  The exit status is zero when  the
              requested information was found.

              If a key value of - is specified, the program reads key values from the standard input stream. The
              exit status is zero when at least one of the requested keys was found.

       -f     Do not fold the lookup key to lower case while creating or querying a table.

              With Postfix version 2.3 and later, this option has  no  effect  for  regular  expression  tables.
              There, case folding is controlled by appending a flag to a pattern.

       -i     Incremental  mode.  Read  entries from standard input and do not truncate an existing database. By
              default, postalias(1) creates a new database from the entries in file_name.

       -N     Include the terminating null character  that  terminates  lookup  keys  and  values.  By  default,
              postalias(1) does whatever is the default for the host operating system.

       -n     Don't  include  the terminating null character that terminates lookup keys and values. By default,
              postalias(1) does whatever is the default for the host operating system.

       -o     Do not release root privileges when processing a non-root input  file.  By  default,  postalias(1)
              drops root privileges and runs as the source file owner instead.

       -p     Do not inherit the file access permissions from the input file when creating a new file.  Instead,
              create a new file with default access permissions (mode 0644).

       -q key Search the specified maps for key and write the first value found to the standard  output  stream.
              The exit status is zero when the requested information was found.

              If  a key value of - is specified, the program reads key values from the standard input stream and
              writes one line of key: value output for each key that was found. The exit status is zero when  at
              least one of the requested keys was found.

       -r     When  updating  a table, do not complain about attempts to update existing entries, and make those
              updates anyway.

       -s     Retrieve all database elements, and write one line of key: value  output  for  each  element.  The
              elements  are  printed  in database order, which is not necessarily the same as the original input
              order.  This feature is available in Postfix version 2.2 and later, and is not available  for  all
              database types.

       -u     Disable  UTF-8  support.  UTF-8  support  is  enabled  by default when "smtputf8_enable = yes". It
              requires that keys and values are valid UTF-8 strings.

       -v     Enable verbose logging for debugging purposes. Multiple -v options make the software  increasingly
              verbose.

       -w     When updating a table, do not complain about attempts to update existing entries, and ignore those
              attempts.

       Arguments:

       file_type
              The database type. To find out what types are supported, use the "postconf -m" command.

              The postalias(1) command can query any supported file type, but it can create only  the  following
              file types:

              btree  The  output is a btree file, named file_name.db.  This is available on systems with support
                     for db databases.

              cdb    The output is one file named file_name.cdb.  This is available on systems with support  for
                     cdb databases.

              dbm    The output consists of two files, named file_name.pag and file_name.dir.  This is available
                     on systems with support for dbm databases.

              hash   The output is a hashed file, named file_name.db.  This is available on systems with support
                     for db databases.

              fail   A  table  that reliably fails all requests. The lookup table name is used for logging only.
                     This table exists to simplify Postfix error tests.

              sdbm   The output consists of two files, named file_name.pag and file_name.dir.  This is available
                     on systems with support for sdbm databases.

              When  no  file_type  is  specified,  the  software  uses  the  database  type  specified  via  the
              default_database_type configuration parameter.  The default value for this  parameter  depends  on
              the host environment.

       file_name
              The name of the alias database source file when creating a database.

DIAGNOSTICS

       Problems  are  logged  to  the standard error stream and to syslogd(8).  No output means that no problems
       were detected. Duplicate entries are skipped and are flagged with a warning.

       postalias(1) terminates with zero exit status in case of success  (including  successful  "postalias  -q"
       lookup) and terminates with non-zero exit status in case of failure.

ENVIRONMENT

       MAIL_CONFIG
              Directory with Postfix configuration files.

       MAIL_VERBOSE
              Enable verbose logging for debugging purposes.

CONFIGURATION PARAMETERS

       The following main.cf parameters are especially relevant to this program.

       The text below provides only a parameter summary. See postconf(5) for more details including examples.

       alias_database (see 'postconf -d' output)
              The  alias  databases  for  local(8) delivery that are updated with "newaliases" or with "sendmail
              -bi".

       config_directory (see 'postconf -d' output)
              The default location of the Postfix main.cf and master.cf configuration files.

       berkeley_db_create_buffer_size (16777216)
              The per-table I/O buffer size for programs that create Berkeley DB hash or btree tables.

       berkeley_db_read_buffer_size (131072)
              The per-table I/O buffer size for programs that read Berkeley DB hash or btree tables.

       default_database_type (see 'postconf -d' output)
              The default database type for use in newaliases(1), postalias(1) and postmap(1) commands.

       smtputf8_enable (yes)
              Enable preliminary SMTPUTF8 support for the protocols described in RFC 6531..6533.

       syslog_facility (mail)
              The syslog facility of Postfix logging.

       syslog_name (see 'postconf -d' output)
              The mail system name that is prepended to the process name in  syslog  records,  so  that  "smtpd"
              becomes, for example, "postfix/smtpd".

STANDARDS

       RFC 822 (ARPA Internet Text Messages)

SEE ALSO

       aliases(5), format of alias database input file.
       local(8), Postfix local delivery agent.
       postconf(1), supported database types
       postconf(5), configuration parameters
       postmap(1), create/update/query lookup tables
       newaliases(1), Sendmail compatibility interface.
       syslogd(8), system logging

README FILES

       Use "postconf readme_directory" or "postconf html_directory" to locate this information.
       DATABASE_README, Postfix lookup table overview

LICENSE

       The Secure Mailer license must be distributed with this software.

AUTHOR(S)

       Wietse Venema
       IBM T.J. Watson Research
       P.O. Box 704
       Yorktown Heights, NY 10598, USA

       Wietse Venema
       Google, Inc.
       111 8th Avenue
       New York, NY 10011, USA

                                                                                                    POSTALIAS(1)