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Date:      Fri, 13 Dec 2002 07:18:31 -0600
From:      Neil W Rickert <sendmail+rickert@sendmail.org>
To:        Kirk Bailey <idiot1@netzero.net>
Cc:        sendmail-questions@sendmail.org, freebsd-questions@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: automatin the creation/destruction of email lists 
Message-ID:  <22461.1039785511@euclid.cs.niu.edu>
In-Reply-To: Message from Kirk Bailey <idiot1@netzero.net>  of "Fri, 13 Dec 2002 02:05:56 EST." <3DF986D4.7060007@netzero.net> 
References:  <3DF986D4.7060007@netzero.net> 

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Kirk Bailey <idiot1@netzero.net> wrote:

>ok, this one is tough. I am writing 4 scripts- 2 sdevlope webforms, and are 
>done, no problem. The other two respectively create or destroy email lists. Or 
>at least that's the goal.

>Sendmail is VERY persnickity about permissions and ownerships for the aliases 
>files- at least. I have edited sendmail.cf so it compiles from a second 
>aliases file, aliases.tinylist, which is in /etc/mail, and it reads the file 
>fine. Note the webscript runs by apache (as nobody) cannot write to the /mail 
>dir; it bombs at this point.

>If I set the dir so other identities can write to it, sendmail get's VERY 
>upset when I issue the newaliases command.

>so either it accepts the file, but I cannot write to it, or I cannot write to 
>it, but it accepts the file. sigh...

>What's a fellow to do? Please advise.

There is a good reason for sendmail being fussy.  There are serious
security concerns with the use of aliases.  These are mainly when the
alias expansion is either a file path or a command pipe.

Your best bet is to have your web application write to a different
file.  Run a frequent cron job.  The cron job should sanitize the
data (remove anything with file paths or command pipes), copy to the
main aliases file, then run new aliases.

 -NWR

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