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5 <title> Postfix manual - bounce(
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10 bounce - Postfix bounce message template format
13 <b><a href=
"postconf.5.html#bounce_template_file">bounce_template_file
</a> = /etc/postfix/bounce.cf
</b>
15 <b>postconf -b
</b> [
<i>template
</i><b>_
</b><i>file
</i>]
18 The Postfix
<a href=
"bounce.8.html"><b>bounce
</b>(
8)
</a> server produces delivery status
19 notification (DSN) messages for undeliverable mail,
20 delayed mail, successful delivery or address verification
23 By default, these notifications are generated from built-
24 in templates with message headers and message text. Sites
25 can override the built-in information by specifying a
26 bounce template file with the
<b><a href=
"postconf.5.html#bounce_template_file">bounce_template_file
</a></b> config-
29 This document describes the general procedure to create a
30 bounce template file, followed by the specific details of
31 bounce template formats.
33 <b>GENERAL PROCEDURE
</b>
34 To create a customized bounce template file, create a tem-
35 porary copy of the file
<b>/etc/postfix/bounce.cf.default
</b> and
36 edit the temporary file.
38 To preview the results of $
<i>name
</i> expansions in the template
41 <b>postconf -b
</b> <i>temporary
</i><b>_
</b><i>file
</i>
43 Errors in the template will be reported to the standard
44 error stream and to the syslog daemon.
46 While previewing the text, be sure to pay particular
47 attention to the expansion of time value parameters that
48 appear in the delayed mail notification text.
50 Once the result is satisfactory, copy the template to the
51 Postfix configuration directory and specify in
<a href=
"postconf.5.html">main.cf
</a>
54 /etc/postfix/
<a href=
"postconf.5.html">main.cf
</a>:
55 <a href=
"postconf.5.html#bounce_template_file">bounce_template_file
</a> = /etc/postfix/bounce.cf
57 <b>TEMPLATE FILE FORMAT
</b>
58 The template file can specify templates for failed mail,
59 delayed mail, successful delivery or for address verifica-
60 tion. These templates are named
<b>failure_template
</b>,
61 <b>delay_template
</b>,
<b>success_template
</b> and
<b>verify_template
</b>,
62 respectively. You can but do not have to specify all four
63 templates in a bounce template file.
65 Each template starts with
"<i>template</i><b>_</b><i>name</i> <b>=</b> <<<b>EOF</b>" and ends
66 with a line that contains the word
"<b>EOF</b>" only. You can
67 change the word EOF, but you can't enclose it in quotes as
68 with the shell or with Perl (
<i>template
</i><b>_
</b><i>name
</i> <b>=
</b> <<<b>'EOF'
</b>).
71 # The failure template is used for undeliverable mail.
73 failure_template =
<<EOF
75 From: MAILER-DAEMON (Mail Delivery System)
76 Subject: Undelivered Mail Returned to Sender
77 Postmaster-Subject: Postmaster Copy: Undelivered Mail
79 This is the mail system at host $
<a href=
"postconf.5.html#myhostname">myhostname
</a>.
81 I'm sorry to have to inform you that your message could not
82 be delivered to one or more recipients. It's attached below.
84 For further assistance, please send mail to postmaster.
86 If you do so, please include this problem report. You can
87 delete your own text from the attached returned message.
92 The usage and specification of bounce templates is subject
93 to the following restrictions:
95 <b>o
</b> No special meaning is given to the backslash char-
96 acter or to leading whitespace; these are always
99 <b>o
</b> Inside the
<< context, the
"$" character is spe-
100 cial. To produce a
"$" character as output, specify
103 <b>o
</b> Outside the
<< context, lines beginning with
"#"
104 are ignored, as are empty lines, and lines consist-
105 ing of whitespace only.
107 Examples of all templates can be found in the file
108 <b>bounce.cf.default
</b> in the Postfix configuration directory.
110 <b>TEMPLATE HEADER FORMAT
</b>
111 The first portion of a bounce template consists of
112 optional template headers. Some become message headers in
113 the delivery status notification; some control the format-
114 ting of that notification. Headers not specified in a tem-
115 plate will be left at their default value.
117 The following headers are supported:
120 The MIME character set of the template message
121 text. See the
"TEMPLATE MESSAGE TEXT FORMAT"
124 <b>From:
</b> The sender address in the message header of the
125 delivery status notification.
128 The subject in the message header of the delivery
129 status notification that is returned to the sender.
131 <b>Postmaster-Subject:
</b>
132 The subject that will be used in Postmaster copies
133 of undeliverable or delayed mail notifications.
134 These copies are sent under control of the
135 <a href=
"postconf.5.html#notify_classes">notify_classes
</a> configuration parameter.
137 The usage and specification of template message headers is
138 subject to the following restrictions:
140 <b>o
</b> Template message header names can be specified in
141 upper case, lower case or mixed case. Postfix
142 always produces bounce message header labels of the
143 form
"<b>From:</b>" and
"<b>Subject:</b>".
145 <b>o
</b> Template message headers must not span multiple
148 <b>o
</b> Template message headers do not support $parameter
151 <b>o
</b> Template message headers must contain ASCII charac-
152 ters only, and must not contain ASCII null charac-
155 <b>TEMPLATE MESSAGE TEXT FORMAT
</b>
156 The second portion of a bounce template consists of mes-
157 sage text. As the above example shows, template message
158 text may contain
<a href=
"postconf.5.html">main.cf
</a> $parameters. Besides the parame-
159 ters that are defined in
<a href=
"postconf.5.html">main.cf
</a>, the following parameters
160 are treated specially depending on the suffix that is
161 appended to their name.
163 <b>delay_warning_time_
</b><i>suffix
</i>
164 Expands into the value of the
<b><a href=
"postconf.5.html#delay_warning_time">delay_warning_time
</a></b>
165 parameter, expressed in the time unit specified by
166 <i>suffix
</i>, which is one of
<b>seconds
</b>,
<b>minutes
</b>,
<b>hours,
</b>
167 <b>days
</b>, or
<b>weeks
</b>.
169 <b>maximal_queue_lifetime_
</b><i>suffix
</i>
170 Expands into the value of the
<b><a href=
"postconf.5.html#maximal_queue_lifetime">maximal_queue_life
</a>-
</b>
171 <b><a href=
"postconf.5.html#maximal_queue_lifetime">time
</a></b> parameter, expressed in the time unit speci-
172 fied by
<i>suffix
</i>. See above under
<b><a href=
"postconf.5.html#delay_warning_time">delay_warning_time
</a></b>
173 for possible
<i>suffix
</i> values.
175 The usage and specification of template message text is
176 subject to the following restrictions:
178 <b>o
</b> The template message text is not sent in Postmaster
179 copies of delivery status notifications.
181 <b>o
</b> If the template message text contains non-ASCII
182 characters, Postfix requires that the
<b>Charset:
</b> tem-
183 plate header is updated. Specify an appropriate
184 superset of US-ASCII. A superset is needed because
185 Postfix appends ASCII text after the message tem-
186 plate when it sends a delivery status notification.
189 <a href=
"bounce.8.html">bounce(
8)
</a>, Postfix delivery status notifications
190 <a href=
"postconf.5.html">postconf(
5)
</a>, configuration parameters
193 The Secure Mailer license must be distributed with this
197 The Postfix bounce template format was originally devel-
198 oped by Nicolas Riendeau.
202 IBM T.J. Watson Research
204 Yorktown Heights, NY
10598, USA
207 </pre> </body> </html>