Re: [cobalt-developers] Firewall says: Unusual System Events using -f

["Jonathan Michaelson" <michaelsonjd@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hello,

> Apr  9 19:37:00 cob2 sendmail[29182]: h39Hb0F29182:
Authentication-Warning: cob2.***.com: httpd set sender to
lomail@elgische***.com using -f
<snip>
> I'm not a programmer but AFAICT using -f means we added an extra parameter
'-f' as the from field in the newsletter script to route bounced messages to
the from address instead of the server admin. FYI: the newsletter is sent by
the PHP mail() command twice a week.
>
> Any suggestions on how to avoid those Unusual system events messages?
Since the newsletter is quite large, the Unusual system events message is
large too, > 1 MB... Or just ignore them?

You're correct in that -f sets the <return-path> header field when sending
through sendmail. It's common practice to do this from CGI/PHP scripts as
otherwise they have <return-path> fields of the web server process which is
pretty useless and forcing the value to be the same as the From: field makes
sense.

With sendmail, you can stop the messages from appearing in the log files
simply by entering the user (in this case httpd) in the file:
/etc/mail/trusted-users

Here's the proper description at the top of the file from a non-RaQ sendmail
installation:
# trusted-users - users that can send mail as others without a warning

Alternatively, you can always filter them out by placing a carefully crafted
regexp in your /usr/local/etc/logcheck.ignore file. Something like:
sendmail.*Authentication-Warning

--
Regards,
Jonathan Michaelson
Commercial CGI Scripting, Web Hosting
Web-based Email, Homepage Creation and Live Help products
http://www.webumake.com