From owner-freebsd-hackers Sun Nov 24 17:13:29 1996 Return-Path: owner-hackers Received: (from root@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.5/8.7.3) id RAA25667 for hackers-outgoing; Sun, 24 Nov 1996 17:13:29 -0800 (PST) Received: from lestat.nas.nasa.gov (lestat.nas.nasa.gov [129.99.50.29]) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.7.5/8.7.3) with ESMTP id RAA25645 for ; Sun, 24 Nov 1996 17:13:14 -0800 (PST) Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by lestat.nas.nasa.gov (8.7.5/8.6.12) with SMTP id RAA22845; Sun, 24 Nov 1996 17:06:20 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <199611250106.RAA22845@lestat.nas.nasa.gov> X-Authentication-Warning: lestat.nas.nasa.gov: Host localhost [127.0.0.1] didn't use HELO protocol To: Michael Smith Cc: peter@taronga.com (Peter da Silva), jkh@time.cdrom.com, hackers@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Replacing sendmail (Re: non-root users binding to ports < 1024 (was: Re: BoS: Exploit for sendmail smtpd bug (ver. 8.7-8.8.2 Reply-To: Jason Thorpe From: Jason Thorpe Date: Sun, 24 Nov 1996 17:06:19 -0800 Sender: owner-hackers@freebsd.org X-Loop: FreeBSD.org Precedence: bulk On Mon, 25 Nov 1996 10:36:57 +1030 (CST) Michael Smith wrote: > "Sendmail is the de-facto Unix standard mail delivery agent. Is is > continually subjected to rigorous security scrutiny and frequently > updated. It provides advanced mail-handling features, and any > unix system administrator will feel immediately at home with it. > Qmail is an obscure mail delivery agent that is claimed to be > secure. Nobody much uses it, and it is not scrutinised in anything > like as much detail. If you have problems with it, you're likely > to have trouble finding competent local support. Which foot would > you like to shoot?" Oh, well, there's smail and mmdf, too... don't forget those... :-) So, for the record, JT Conklin and I made the decision to switch mail.netbsd.org to qmail... Not only is the qmail developers list very responsive to problems, but the documentation is so good that you probably won't _need_ to ask any questions. We learned qmail in a few days, and have been quite happy with the performance of our mail server as a result. > Sure, Qmail may well be the best thing since sliced bread. But making it > the standard FreeBSD mail utility will achieve two things : So, JT and I also discussed putting qmail in the NetBSD source tree, and making it optional. We haven't done anything about that yet, but it's still a possibility... > - expose a pile of security holes that the Qmail developer(s) never > thought existed. > - make FreeBSD the laughing stock of the unix community. Nah... have them both, and let the user choose in /etc/make.conf. Qmail is tiny. Jason R. Thorpe thorpej@nas.nasa.gov NASA Ames Research Center Home: 408.866.1912 NAS: M/S 258-6 Work: 415.604.0935 Moffett Field, CA 94035 Pager: 415.428.6939