ramey@jello.csc.ti.com (05/26/90)
I recently installed SunOS 4.1 on a Sun 4, and imported that system's /usr/spool/mail directory from a Sun 4 running 4.0.3. I noticed a couple of things: it seems that sendmail notices that /usr/spool/mail is mounted on a NFS directory, and mostly ignores the sendmail.cf file if this is the case. It seems to just blindly forward any outgoing mail to the NFS server. Is this documented anywhere? I read the release notes, and skimmed through the sendmail docs, but couldn't find any mention of this. Also, I couldn't get /usr/ucb/mail to work properly in this case. It takes several seconds to start up, prints out the subjects, then exits when you try to read a message. /usr/bin/mail works okay, as does movemail (in GNU Emacs rmail). I also compiled up Mail from the 4.3 bsd tahoe sources, and it works fine too. I guess it has something to do with locking, but I couldn't tell exactly. I don't allow root access to this filesystem (in the server's exports file), in case this matters. Has anyone else had similar experiences? Does the fact that the server is running 4.0.3 instead of 4.1 make any difference? Joe Ramey TI Computer Science Center ramey@csc.ti.com
vmj@bbl.be (Johan Van Mengsel) (05/30/90)
In article <8198@brazos.Rice.edu>, ramey@jello.csc.ti.com writes: > I recently installed SunOS 4.1 on a Sun 4, and imported that system's > /usr/spool/mail directory from a Sun 4 running 4.0.3. I noticed a couple > of things: it seems that sendmail notices that /usr/spool/mail is mounted > on a NFS directory, and mostly ignores the sendmail.cf file if this is the > case. It seems to just blindly forward any outgoing mail to the NFS > server. Is this documented anywhere? I read the release notes, and > skimmed through the sendmail docs, but couldn't find any mention of this. The reason why the sendmail blindly forward any outgoing mail to the NFS server is probably caused by the remote option in the configuration file. If you want to disable this option, look for the following lines in the sendmail.cf # Remote mode - send through server if mailbox directory is mounted OR and outcomment the second one. Johan Van Mengsel. vmj@bbl.be Temporaly stationed at BBL. (tel. +32 2 7382255) I.M.X. - The Open Systems Experts Information Management Systems & Services TEL. +32 2 7254950 Imperiastraat 10 FAX. +32 2 7254605 1930 Zaventem Belgium
datri@uunet.uu.net (Anthony A. Datri) (06/02/90)
I've been trying to determine just what the locking issues are with NFS mounting /usr/spool/mail. Binmail is generally used by the server's sendmail to do local delivery. The binmail sources I have (sendmail 5.61) don't do flock/fcntl on the mailbox -- does Sun's binmail do this locking? Certain people here who are against the idea of NFS mounting /usr/spool/mail (and doing mail on the workstations in general) say that the world will blow up because of the non-locking (most of our mail servers wouldn't be Suns). Can anyone enlighten me on these issues?
jms@tardis.tymnet.com (Joe Smith) (06/11/90)
In article <8453@brazos.Rice.edu> convex!datri@uunet.uu.net (Anthony A. Datri) writes: >X-Sun-Spots-Digest: Volume 9, Issue 194, message 3 >Certain people here who are against the idea of NFS mounting >/usr/spool/mail (and doing mail on the workstations in general) say that >the world will blow up because of the non-locking (most of our mail >servers wouldn't be Suns). Can anyone enlighten me on these issues? The versions of sendmail.cf that come from Sun have the setting "OR" turned on. When sendmail detects that /var/spool/mail is NFS mounted, it delivers mail to the server instead of writing directly into /var/spool/mail. That appears to solve the problem with multiple incoming messages, but I'm not sure if MUSH, ELM, and all of the other mail reading programs do the right thing while reading. Joe Smith (408)922-6220 | SMTP: jms@tardis.tymnet.com or jms@gemini.tymnet.com BT Tymnet Tech Services | UUCP: ...!{ames,pyramid}!oliveb!tymix!tardis!jms PO Box 49019, MS-C41 | BIX: smithjoe | 12 PDP-10s still running! "POPJ P," San Jose, CA 95161-9019 | humorous dislaimer: "My Amiga speaks for me."