Re: Case sensitive usernames and sendmail - mystic voodoo
Hi, On Sun, 26 May 2013 18:44:41 -0600 Modulok modu...@gmail.com wrote: List, Step1: Make a new user:: root@localhost# pw useradd foo -m -s /bin/tcsh -h 0 password for user foo: (secret) Step 2: Does sendmail know them:: root@modunix# sendmail -bv foo@localhost foo@localhost... deliverable: mailer local, user foo # Good... Step 3: Make a new user with uppercase 'B':: root@localhost# pw useradd Bar -m -s /bin/tcsh -h 0 password for user Bar: (secret) Step 4: Does sendmail know them:: root@modunix# sendmail -bv Bar@localhost Bar@localhost... User unknown Curious, why? I know usernames are case-sensitive, I thought emails were too. Without fighting an epic battle with with the sendmail configs, is there a simple way to make this work? The obvious answer is probably, usernames should be lowercase! and for new users I'll enforce that policy. For existing users however, who may already have lots of case-sensitive usernames in various config files, etc this isn't a real option. By just altering their usernames I'm afraid I'd break the whole damn universe. How can I enable mail for them? have you read this? http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/linux-software-2/sendmail-unable-to-find-users-22290/ Erich ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-questions-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: Case sensitive usernames and sendmail - mystic voodoo
On Sun, 26 May 2013 18:44:41 -0600, Modulok wrote: I know usernames are case-sensitive, I thought emails were too. If I remember e-mail basics correctly: No. They're not. For example, f...@example.com, f...@example.com and f...@example.com and all upper/lowercase variations are the same as f...@example.com. For sending mail within a system and across systems, names in the passwd file have to be in conjunction with the respective mail queues for the users. Even foo and Foo can coexist (as soon as they have a different UID, reflecting the fact that two distinguishable users are intended), but regarding mail... that sounds problematic. Without fighting an epic battle with with the sendmail configs, is there a simple way to make this work? Use lowercase usernames only. Make it a convention. Verify it. The obvious answer is probably, usernames should be lowercase! and for new users I'll enforce that policy. For existing users however, who may already have lots of case-sensitive usernames in various config files, etc this isn't a real option. That's true, but didn't this approach get you in trouble earlier? By just altering their usernames I'm afraid I'd break the whole damn universe. This is quite possible. As you mentioned correctly, usernames with uppercase letters may already appear in config files. You _could_ check for each user below his $HOME for any appearing in a file and replace this, but that could cause trouble if something is stored in a Registry-like binary file. Regarding /etc/passwd, the home directory _may_ be a different name than the username, so those _pathnames_ in files should not require a change. But files mentioning _usernames_ will probably cause problems. How can I enable mail for them? Maybe it's possible to use /etc/mail/aliases? -- Polytropon Magdeburg, Germany Happy FreeBSD user since 4.0 Andra moi ennepe, Mousa, ... ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-questions-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: Case sensitive usernames and sendmail - mystic voodoo
On Sun, May 26, 2013 at 6:17 PM, Polytropon free...@edvax.de wrote: On Sun, 26 May 2013 18:44:41 -0600, Modulok wrote: I know usernames are case-sensitive, I thought emails were too. If I remember e-mail basics correctly: No. They're not. For example, f...@example.com, f...@example.com and f...@example.com and all upper/lowercase variations are the same as f...@example.com. You remember incorrectly ;-) The local part of an address (before the @ sign) is case-sensitive (with the exception of postmas...@example.com) Everything to the right of the @ is indeed case insensitive, but everything to the left might be case sensitive, depending on local policy. This means you must preserve the case of everything to the left of the @ sign. ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-questions-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: Case sensitive usernames and sendmail - mystic voodoo
On Sun, 26 May 2013 18:36:41 -0700, Michael Sierchio wrote: On Sun, May 26, 2013 at 6:17 PM, Polytropon free...@edvax.de wrote: On Sun, 26 May 2013 18:44:41 -0600, Modulok wrote: I know usernames are case-sensitive, I thought emails were too. If I remember e-mail basics correctly: No. They're not. For example, f...@example.com, f...@example.com and f...@example.com and all upper/lowercase variations are the same as f...@example.com. You remember incorrectly ;-) I checked again - and yes, it seems that my memory about the valid definition has changed to what is reality today, i. e. sendmail rewriting uppercase to lowercase prior to further processing. The local part of an address (before the @ sign) is case-sensitive (with the exception of postmas...@example.com) So it depends on how sendmail is configured that it does not matter today. Everything to the right of the @ is indeed case insensitive, but everything to the left might be case sensitive, depending on local policy. This means you must preserve the case of everything to the left of the @ sign. According to the link provided by Erich Dollansky, FreeBSD's default sendmail.cf setting of Mlocal, P=/usr/libexec/mail.local, F=lsDFMAw5 needs to be added the u option to the F= parameter to preserve the uppercase letters in the the left side (username) of the address. Maybe this additiion is required in other cf files containing Mlocal settings too? Of course it would be nice if there was a corresponding setting for the mc files which the cf files are usually generated from... -- Polytropon Magdeburg, Germany Happy FreeBSD user since 4.0 Andra moi ennepe, Mousa, ... ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-questions-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: Case sensitive usernames and sendmail - mystic voodoo
Everything to the right of the @ is indeed case insensitive, but everything to the left might be case sensitive, depending on local policy. This means you must preserve the case of everything to the left of the @ sign. According to the link provided by Erich Dollansky, FreeBSD's default sendmail.cf setting of Mlocal, P=/usr/libexec/mail.local, F=lsDFMAw5 needs to be added the u option to the F= parameter to preserve the uppercase letters in the the left side (username) of the address. Maybe this additiion is required in other cf files containing Mlocal settings too? Of course it would be nice if there was a corresponding setting for the mc files which the cf files are usually generated from... So, best practices aside, this would be a bug in the default config? (i.e. can I celebrate my bug-finding yet?) Cheers! -Modulok- ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-questions-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
Re: Case sensitive usernames and sendmail - mystic voodoo
On Sun, 26 May 2013 21:31:09 -0600, Modulok wrote: Everything to the right of the @ is indeed case insensitive, but everything to the left might be case sensitive, depending on local policy. This means you must preserve the case of everything to the left of the @ sign. According to the link provided by Erich Dollansky, FreeBSD's default sendmail.cf setting of Mlocal, P=/usr/libexec/mail.local, F=lsDFMAw5 needs to be added the u option to the F= parameter to preserve the uppercase letters in the the left side (username) of the address. Maybe this additiion is required in other cf files containing Mlocal settings too? Of course it would be nice if there was a corresponding setting for the mc files which the cf files are usually generated from... So, best practices aside, this would be a bug in the default config? No. A convention. :-) (i.e. can I celebrate my bug-finding yet?) Depends. If it's a _desired_ convention (because people regularly have problems with e-mail addresses and just don't care for upper and lower case), it's a good default setting. In _your_ case, it does not apply, because it introduces problems. So if you intend to make a local modification, that's no problem because you _can_ configure such things. This is the power that comes by the freedom of choice. You can celebrate this. :-) -- Polytropon Magdeburg, Germany Happy FreeBSD user since 4.0 Andra moi ennepe, Mousa, ... ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to freebsd-questions-unsubscr...@freebsd.org
