<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//IETF//DTD HTML 2.0//EN"> <!--Converted with LaTeX2HTML 96.1-c (Feb 29, 1996) by Nikos Drakos (nikos@cbl.leeds.ac.uk), CBLU, University of Leeds --> <HTML> <HEAD> <TITLE>Configuration Files - Overview</TITLE> </HEAD> <BODY LANG="EN"> <A HREF="node1.html"><IMG WIDTH=65 HEIGHT=24 ALIGN=BOTTOM ALT="contents" SRC="contents_motif.gif"></A> <BR> <B> Next:</B> <A HREF="node221.html">The sendmail.cf File</A> <B>Up:</B> <A HREF="node218.html">Sendmail+IDA</A> <B> Previous:</B> <A HREF="node219.html">Introduction to Sendmail+IDA</A> <BR> <P> <H1><A NAME="SECTION0017200000">Configuration Files - Overview</A></H1> Traditional sendmail is set up through a system configuration file (typically /etc/sendmail.cf or /usr/lib/sendmail.cf), that is not anything close to any language you've seen before. Editing the sendmail.cf file to provide customized behavior can be a humbling experience. <P> Sendmail+IDA makes such pain essentially a thing of the past by having all configuration options table-driven with rather easy to understand syntax. These options are configured by running m4 (a macro processor) or dbm (a database processor) on a number of data files via Makefiles supplied with the sources. <P> The sendmail.cf file defines only the default behavior of the system. Virtually all special customization is done through a number of optional tables rather than by directly editing the sendmail.cf file. A list of all sendmail tables is given in figure-<A HREF="node220.html#sendmailfigtables"><IMG ALIGN=BOTTOM ALT="gif" SRC="cross_ref_motif.gif"></A>. <P> <STRONG>Figure:</STRONG> <A NAME="sendmailfigtables"></A> sendmail Support Files. <BR> <P><BR> <HR> <P><ADDRESS> <I>Andrew Anderson <BR> Thu Mar 7 23:22:06 EST 1996</I> </ADDRESS> </BODY> </HTML>