Re: [EXIM] migration from sendmail to exim

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Author: Nigel Metheringham
Date:  
To: eximlist
CC: James Dehnert, exim-users
Subject: Re: [EXIM] migration from sendmail to exim

eximlist@??? said:
> Well, there is only one machine that is the MX for the domain. But
> other machines occasionally originate and deliver local mail (such as
> system crontasks sending to root.. etc) to /var/spool/mail which is
> NFS mounted on all machines.


I would reconfigure that cluster so that only one machine delivers and
all the rest deliver to it - this has many advantages - single point of
management (the pain caused by mislaligned alias files is horrid),
single delivery process etc.

> Does procmail properly lock over NFS?


Yes, within the limits of NFS. NFS locking is not reliable enough to
stake your career/life/marriage/testicles on. It just ain't no matter
what the sales people tell you.


> I am under the impression that exim does handle locking NFS-mounted
> mailspools properly - am I incorrect?


[duplicate previous answer]

> Why is locking over NFS a problem, especially if lockfiles are used?
> (eg /var/spool/mail/root.lock)? Is it only a problem for flock/lockf
> types of locking? (which I don't wholly understand anyway)


> Better yet, is there an FAQ or some other document discussing locking
> mailspools over NFS that I could refer to?


I used to run a mail system with NFS mounted spool on Sun systems (Suns
do good NFS locking). It occasionally lost/corrupt mail.

    Nigel.
-- 
[ Nigel Metheringham                  Nigel.Metheringham@??? ]
[ Phone: +44 1423 850000                         Fax +44 1423 858866 ]




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