This man page may be out of date. Please see the
Administrator's Guide
included in the distribution or on the Qpopper web site at
www.qpopper.org/documentation.html
DESCRIPTION
Qpopper
is a POP3 server to enable POP3 clients to read and download mail. This server
implements the POP protocol defined in RFC 1939 and the RFC 2449 extensions. This
implementation runs on a variety of Unix platforms, including Linux.
The server also enables clients to send mail using XTND XMIT, which is processed
via
sendmail(8).
OPTIONS
[address][:][port]
If compiled as a standalone daemon (instead of being run from
inetd),
you can can specify the IP
address
and/or
port
number to bind to at run-time as
parameter 1, e.g., 'popper 199.46.50.7:8110 -S' or 'popper 8110 -S -T600'.
If not specified, the IP
address
defaults to all available. The default
port
is 110 except when _DEBUG (not simply DEBUG) is defined, then it is 8765.
See the Administrator's Guide file for more information on standalone mode.
-b bulldir
Turns on the bulletin feature and specifies the
bulletin directory
path. The command line overrides the compiled value if it is defined. To enable
bulletins by default and specify a default bulletin directory during
compilation, include the --enable-bulletins=bull-directory flag when
running ./configure. The usual bulletin directory is /var/spool/bulls.
A bulletin
database can be used to track the bulletins instead of the users' home directory.
This feature is enabled by including the --enable-bulldb=bull-directory flag
when running ./configure.
-c
Downcases user names. This permits users to configure their clients with user
names in UPPER or MiXeD case, and still login, assuming their actual user name
is all lower case.
-d
Turns on debug logging if compiled (pass --enable-debugging to ./configure).
All debugging information is saved using
syslog(8).
If this option is used, it should be first, so that debug records are
generated for subsequent options.
-D drac-host
If compiled with --enable-drac, specifies the
drac host.
Defaults to localhost.
-e x=value,...
Sets POP3 extensions. Sets
x
to the specified
value.
Used to include Login Delay and/or Expire response tags to the CAPA command.
Remember neither Expire nor Login Delay is enforced by qpopper; Sysadmins have
to implement them by some other means. However, you can enforce EXPIRE 0 (no
retention at all) by using the --enable-auto-delete flag with ./configure. This
causes messages to be automatically deleted after they are downloaded.
-f config-file
Reads additional run-time options from
config-file.
See
Config-File Options
for option names and syntax.
-k
Enables Kerberos authentication when qpopper has been compiled with
--with-kerberos5.
You must already have libraries that support Kerberos.
-K service
The specified Kerberos
service
is used instead of the compiled-in value. The default is
rcmd,
but
pop
is also common.
-l 0|1|2
Sets TLS/SSL handling. Must have compiled with OpenSSL or SSL Plus.
0
is the default. TLS/SSL is not supported.
1
enables the STLS command. This permits a
client to attempt TLS/SSL negotiation after connecting.
2
Causes Qpopper to attempt TLS negotiation when a client first connects.
This is for alternate-port support.
-p 0|1|2|3|4
Sets plain-text password handling options. To use this option, you must have an
alternative to plain-text passwords available, such as APOP.
0
is the default, which permits plain-text passwords only for those users who are
not in the APOP database.
1 disables plain-text passwords for all users, even those who are not in the
APOP database.
2 permits plain-text passwords for all users, even those who are in the APOP
database (this allows clients to fall back on plain-text authentication if they
do not support APOP).
3 allows plain-text passwords only for connections on the loop-back (127.*.*.*)
address.
4 permits plain-text passwords only if
TLS/SSL has been negotiated for the session (requires an executable compiled
with OpenSSL or SSL Plus).
-R
Disables reverse lookups on client IP addresses.
-t trace-file
Turns on debug logging if compiled (pass --enable-debugging to ./configure) and
writes the trace information in
trace-file
using
fprintf(3V).
If this option is used, it should be first, so that debug records are
generated for subsequent options.
-s
Turns on statistics logging using
syslog(8)
or
trace-file.
At the end of each popper
session, the following information is logged: username, number of
messages deleted, number of bytes deleted, number of message left on server,
number of bytes left on server.
-S
Enables server mode. This mode reduces disk I/O and disk space usage
when popper is used on a system that serves POP only users exclusively.
-T timeout
option changes the default compiled value POP_TIMEOUT for terminating a
session with a pop client.
When the server is waiting for a command to arrive from the client, it
times out after the specified number of seconds and terminates the session.
This avoids having popper processes hang forever waiting for command input
from clients which have terminated abnormally or are hung.
A small value is ok for small to medium networks where
the network delay is within a few seconds. In this case 15-30 seconds is
not unreasonable. Networks with large delays in sending packets (e.g., SLIP
links) may require a larger value. In this case 300 seconds (5 minutes) is not
unreasonable.
Note that RFC 1939 requires a minimum of 600 second (10 minutes).
-u
After a user authenticates, process options from a file
called .qpopper-options in the user's home directory. This
file can be owned by and writable by the user.
-U
After a user authenticates, process options from a file
called .<user>.qpopper-options in the spool directory,
where <user> is the user name. This file should not be owned by
nor writable by the user.
-v
Report the current version and exit.
Processing Options
are described below.
Processing Options
Here are some options the values of which are announced to clients. Syntax of the
options is:
opt=value,...
This sets option
opt
to be
value.
Multiple options can be specified at one instance and are comma separated.
The following are the options supported:
login_delay expire
Config-File Options
You can set Qpopper run-time options either from
the command line or in a configuration file.
Configuration files use different option names and a different syntax
than the command-line (because command-line options are limited
to one character).
The general syntax of the config file (in ABNF) is:
CHAR ::= <any printable character except space or tab>
In other words the line starts with
set
or
reset,
then an option name, and either ends there or has an
=
followed by a value.
A comment line starts with
#.
The rest of the line is ignored. You can also use
#
to end any line. Everything else on the line is a comment.
Note that
reset
can only be used with boolean options. The
=
and the value are omitted when
reset
is used. When
set
is used with a
boolean option, you can omit the
=
and
value
if you wish (it defaults to
true),
or you can use any of the four values
true,false,1,
or
0.
Some options are "restricted", meaning that they can't be used in
a .qpopper-options file in a user's home directory and/or in
a <user>.qpopper-options file in the spool directory.
The following are the command line options you can use:
announce-login-delay
Type: Integer
Equivalent switch: "-elogin_delay=xx"
Restricted: no
announce-expire
Type: Integer
Equivalent switch: "-e expire=xxx"
Restricted: no
bulldir
Type: Name
Equivalent switch: "-b bulldir"
Restricted: no
bulldb-nonfatal
Type: Boolean
Equivalent switch: "-B"
Restricted: no
Only valid if compiled with --enable-bulldb.
clear-text-password
Type: Mnemonic
Equivalent switch: "-p0|1|2|3|4"
Values:
default
Permits clear-text passwords for any user not in the APOP database.
never
Clear-text passwords are never permitted. Users not in the APOP
database are unable to use Qpopper.
always
Clear-text passwords are always permitted, even for users in the APOP
database.
local
Clear-text passwords are permitted only when the client connects through
the local interface (127.*.*.*).
tls
Clear-text passwords are permitted when TLS/SSL has been negotiated for
the session. Available only if compiled with OpenSSL or SSL Plus.
ssl
(Same as tls).
Restricted: not valid in a configuration file in the user's home directory
nor in the spool directory.
config-file
Type: Name
Equivalent switch: "-f config-file"
Restricted: no
debug
Type: Boolean
Equivalent switch: "-d debug
Restricted: no
Only valid if compiled with --enable-debug.
downcase-user
Type: Boolean
Equivalent switch: "-c"
Restricted: not valid in a configuration file in the user's home directory
nor in the spool directory.
drac-host
Type: Name
Equivalent switch: "-D drac-host"
Restricted: no
Only valid if compiled with --enable-drac
kerberos
Type: Boolean
Equivalent switch: "-k"
Restricted: not valid in a configuration file in the user's home directory
nor in the spool directory.
Only valid if compiled with --enable-kerberos5 or -DKERBEROS
kerberos-service
Type: Name
Equivalent switch: "-K service-name"
Restricted: not valid in a configuration file in the user's home directory
nor in the spool directory.
Only valid if compiled with --enable-kerberos5 or -DKERBEROS
mail-lock-check
Type: Integer
Equivalent switch: "-L msgs"
Restricted: no
reverse-lookup
Type: Boolean
Equivalent switch: "-R" (Sense reversed!)
Restricted: not valid in a configuration file in the user's home directory
nor in the spool directory.
Sense reversed from command-line switch. Using
-R
is the same as 'SET REVERSE-LOOKUP = FALSE'.
server-mode
Type: Boolean
Equivalent switch: "-S"
Restricted: no
statistics
Type: Boolean
Equivalent switch: "-s"
Restricted: no
timeout
Type: Integer
Equivalent switch: "-T timeout"
Restricted: no
tls-support
Type: Mnemonic
Equivalent switch: "-l"
Values:
default
TLS/SSL not supported.
none
(same as default).
stls
Enables support for the STLS command.
alternate-port
Enables alternate-port TLS/SSL.
Restricted: not valid in a configuration file in the user's home directory
nor in the spool directory.
Only valid if compiled with OpenSSL or SSL Plus.
tracefile
Type: Name
Equivalent switch: "-t logfile"
Restricted: no
Only valid if compiled with --enable-debug.
spool-options
Type: Integer
Equivalent switch: "-U"
Restricted: not valid in a configuration file in the user's home directory
nor in the spool directory.
user-options
Type: Integer
Equivalent switch: "-u"
Restricted: not valid in a configuration file in the user's home directory
nor in the spool directory.
BULLETINS
The bulletin feature gives system administrators a way to send important
announcements to all POP users without having to do mass mailings.
The bulletin directory contains one file per bulletin. Each file
contains a single mail message with a header and body in normal
mailbox format. The first line of each such bulletin must be a "From " line.
The easiest way for sysadmins to create such bulletins is to mail themselves
a copy of the bulletin using the account to which they want replies to be sent,
then use their mail program to save the message to a file in the bulletin
directory in mailbox format. The bulletin directory must be world readable.
The name of each bulletin file begins with the bulletin number, and may
optionally continue with any other characters. E.g., the file name of
bulletin number 23 might be "23.pophost_down_sunday".
Popper creates a file named .popbull
in the home directory of each user.
This file contains a single line recording the highest numbered bulletin
received by the user.
Each time a POP client connects to the server, any new bulletins which
the user has not received previously are automatically appended to the
user's mail.
When a bulletin is copied, the "To" header line
is replaced by "To: username@thishost", and any "Status:" header lines are
deleted. Otherwise, the bulletin is copied as is.
When a new user checks for mail the first time, popper creates the .popbull
file in the user's home directory and seeds it with the current maximum
bulletin number. Thus new users do not get old bulletins.
Bulletins can be enabled by default, and the bulletin directory specified,
by including the --enable-bulletins=bull-directory flag when running ./configure.
To use a database instead of .popbull files in users' home directories
for tracking the highest bulletin seen by a user, include
the --enable-bulldb=bull-directory flag when running ./configure. You must also
create two empty files in the bulletin directory, called bulldb.pag and bulldb.dir.
When a bulletin database is used, qpopper checks for and uses any .popbull files
in the user's home directory, to provide continuity.
To specify the maximum number of bulletins sent to new users, include
the --with-new-bulls flag when running ./configure. For example, --with-new-bulls=10
says that new users get at most ten bulletins.
THE POP TRANSACTION CYCLE
The Qpopper server is a single program (called popper) that is
launched by inetd when it gets a service request on the POP TCP port.
(The official port number specified in RFC 1939 for POP version 3 is
port 110. However, some POP3 clients attempt to contact the server at
port 109, the POP version 2 port. Unless you are running both POP2 and
POP3 servers, you can simply define both ports for use by the POP3
server. This is explained in the installation instructions later on.)
The qpopper program initializes and verifies that the peer IP address is
registered in the local domain (unless the
-R
command-line option is used),
logging a warning message when a
connection is made with a client whose IP address does not have a
canonical name. For systems using BSD 4.3 bind, it also checks to see
if a canonical name lookup for the client returns the same peer IP
address, logging a warning message if it does not.
The server
enters the authorization state, during which the client must correctly
identify itself by providing a valid Unix userid and password on the
server's host machine (or successfully authenticate using
APOP
or
AUTH).
No other exchanges are allowed during this
state (other than a request to quit.) If authentication fails, a
warning message is logged and the session ends.
Once the user is
identified, qpopper changes its user and group ids to match that of the
user and enters the transaction state. The server makes a temporary
copy of the user's maildrop which is
used for all subsequent transactions (unless running in
server mode
).
These include the bulk of POP
commands to retrieve mail, delete mail, undelete mail, and so forth.
When the client quits, the server enters the final update state, during which
the network connection is terminated and the user's maildrop is updated
with the (possibly) modified temporary maildrop.
LOGGING
The POP server uses
syslog
to keep a record of its activities. On
systems with BSD 4.3 syslogging, the server logs (by default) to the
"local0" facility at priority "notice" for all messages except
debugging which is logged at priority "debug". The default log file is
/usr/spool/mqueue/POPlog. These can be changed, if desired. On
systems with 4.2 syslogging all messages are logged to the local log
file, usually /usr/spool/mqueue/syslog.
DEBUGGING
Qpopper logs debugging information when the -d parameter
is specified after its invocation in the inetd.conf file. Care should
be exercised in using this option since it generates considerable
output in the syslog file. Alternatively, the "-t <file-name>" option
places debugging information into file "<file-name>" using fprintf
instead of syslog.
For SunOS version 3.5, the popper program is launched by inetd from
/etc/servers. This file does not allow you to specify command line
arguments. Therefore, if you want to enable debugging, you can specify
a shell script in /etc/servers to be launched instead of popper and in
this script call popper with the desired arguments.
You can confirm that the POP server is running on Unix by telneting to
port 110 (or 109 if you set it up that way). For example:
%telnet pop.qualcomm.com 110
Trying...
Connected to pop.qualcomm.com.
Escape character is '^]'.
+OK QPOP (version 3.0) at pop.qualcomm.com starting.
quit
+OK Pop server at pop.qualcomm.com signing off.
Connection closed by foreign host.
EXTENSIONS
The server implements several extended commands.
XTND XMIT: Sends a mail message using /usr/lib/sendmail.
XTND XLIST header [num]: Extracts and returns the specified header line
for the specified message number. If the "num" parameter is missing,
returns the header line for all the messages which are not currently
marked for deletion.
XMANGLE: Can be used as a modifier to the TOP, RETR, LIST commands. The result
is to condense MIME messages into a single part. For example:
results in transforming message 10 into a single part of content-type
text/html with only those headers which were requested.
Qpopper also supports the "-no-mime" user name hack. As a way to
enable MIME-mangling with clients that do not support XMANGLE, add
"-no-mime" to the user name. For example, if the userid is
"mary", enter it in the client as "mary-no-mime".
FILES
/var/mail mail files
/etc/inetd.conf pop program invocation
/etc/syslog.conf logging specifications
/var/spool/bulls bulletins
~/.popbull largest bulletin number seen by user
Randall Gelles, Praveen Yaramada, Laurence Lundblade, Mark Erickson, Bob Campbell, Edward Moy,
Austin Shelton, Marshall T Rose, and cast of thousands at Rand, UDel, UCI,
QUALCOMM Incorporated and the Internet user community.