ERROR(8postfix)

📦 version 3.8.6, in debian bookworm, ubuntu jammy, ubuntu noble

💖 ERROR(8postfix) 💖

okay bestie, welcome to the error page — aka Postfix error/retry mail delivery agent, from the ERROR(8postfix) manual. sit down, hydrate, and let's get into it 🫶

✨ NAME ✨

error — the Postfix error/retry mail delivery agent. she's the one who delivers the bad news 💅

🌸 SYNOPSIS 🌸

error [generic Postfix daemon options]

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

so basically: the Postfix error(8) delivery agent handles delivery requests coming in from the queue manager. each request is giving you a whole little bundle of info — a queue file, a sender address, the reason for non-delivery (which gets specified as the next-hop destination), and recipient information. that's the whole vibe check of the request ✨

the reason can be prefixed with an RFC 3463-compatible detail code. and if nobody specified one? a default 4.0.0 or 5.0.0 code gets used instead, no stress.

this program expects to be run from the master(8) process manager. that's her whole origin story, periodt.

depending on the service name in master.cf — error or retry — the server bounces or defers all recipients in the delivery request, using the "next-hop" information as the reason for non-delivery. and heads up: the retry service name is supported as of Postfix 2.4. iconic behavior honestly 👑

delivery status reports get sent to the bounce(8), defer(8) or trace(8) daemon, whichever is appropriate. she knows where to route the drama 💌

🔒 SECURITY 🔒

the error(8) mailer is not security-sensitive. she doesn't talk to the network at all, and she can be run chrooted at fixed low privilege. lowkey the most chill daemon in the whole lineup 🙈

📜 STANDARDS 📜

RFC 3463 (Enhanced Status Codes)

🩺 DIAGNOSTICS 🩺

problems and transactions get logged to syslogd(8) or postlogd(8). nothing slips by unnoticed, bestie.

depending on the setting of the notify_classes parameter, the postmaster gets notified of bounces and of other trouble. so yes, someone is watching 😭

⚙️ CONFIGURATION PARAMETERS ⚙️

changes to main.cf are picked up automatically, because error(8) processes only run for a limited amount of time. wanna speed up a change? use the command postfix reload. easy.

the text below is only a parameter summary. see postconf(5) for more details, examples included.

  • 2bounce_notice_recipient (postmaster) — the recipient of undeliverable mail that cannot be returned to the sender.
  • bounce_notice_recipient (postmaster) — the recipient of postmaster notifications with the message headers of mail that Postfix did not deliver, and of SMTP conversation transcripts of mail that Postfix did not receive.
  • config_directory (see 'postconf -d' output) — the default location of the Postfix main.cf and master.cf configuration files.
  • daemon_timeout (18000s) — how much time a Postfix daemon process may take to handle a request before it is terminated by a built-in watchdog timer.
  • delay_logging_resolution_limit (2) — the maximal number of digits after the decimal point when logging sub-second delay values.
  • double_bounce_sender (double-bounce) — the sender address of postmaster notifications that are generated by the mail system.
  • ipc_timeout (3600s) — the time limit for sending or receiving information over an internal communication channel.
  • max_idle (100s) — the maximum amount of time that an idle Postfix daemon process waits for an incoming connection before terminating voluntarily.
  • max_use (100) — the maximal number of incoming connections that a Postfix daemon process will service before terminating voluntarily.
  • notify_classes (resource, software) — the list of error classes that are reported to the postmaster.
  • process_id (read-only) — the process ID of a Postfix command or daemon process.
  • process_name (read-only) — the process name of a Postfix command or daemon process.
  • queue_directory (see 'postconf -d' output) — the location of the Postfix top-level queue directory.
  • syslog_facility (mail) — the syslog facility of Postfix logging.
  • syslog_name (see 'postconf -d' output) — a prefix that is prepended to the process name in syslog records, so that, for example, "smtpd" becomes "prefix/smtpd".

🌈 available in Postfix 3.3 and later 🌈

  • service_name (read-only) — the master.cf service name of a Postfix daemon process.

👀 SEE ALSO 👀

📄 LICENSE 📄

The Secure Mailer license must be distributed with this software.

👑 AUTHOR(S) 👑

Wietse Venema IBM T.J. Watson Research P.O. Box 704 Yorktown Heights, NY 10598, USA

Wietse Venema Google, Inc. 111 8th Avenue New York, NY 10011, USA

okay that's the whole page, bestie 💖 this was the ERROR(8postfix) manual from the Postfix 8postfix set, and the footer just loops back around to ERROR(8postfix) again like a lil outro track 🎀 ty for reading, go slay your mail queue, mwah 💅✨

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