Re: [Exim] Forward Slashes in local parts

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Author: Philip Hazel
Date:  
To: Marc Haber
CC: exim-users
Subject: Re: [Exim] Forward Slashes in local parts
On Tue, 31 Jul 2001, Marc Haber wrote:

> almost every appendfile director contains the local part of the mail
> address some where in the file name being generated. For the file
> option, the manual says that a delivery error is generated if the
> local part contains a forward slash.


This is a bug in the manual. The feature was removed some time ago, but
I can't find an explicit reference in the change log. The comment in the
code says this:

This test is no longer applied. It
is a pretty weak test, and can cause trouble if $local_part appears in the
expanded string, but isn't in fact used as part of the file name (e.g. it
is a lookup key).

> To make messages to this non-existent address properly bounce, I'd
> probably have to replace the forward slash in the file name with a
> different character.


It will be easier to do this in Exim 4, but in Exim 3 you can bounce
local_parts containing slashes by this director

bounce_slash:
driver = smartuser
local_parts = ^.*/
new_address = :fail: Unknown user

> What character would be a good idea? It should be non-lethal in file
> names, and it should be disallowed in local parts of e-mail addresses.
> Is there such a character?


I doubt it. Local parts are permitted to contain almost any character if
it is correctly quoted.


-- 
Philip Hazel            University of Cambridge Computing Service,
ph10@???      Cambridge, England. Phone: +44 1223 334714.