TPOP3D(8) TPOP3D(8)
NAME
tpop3d - small, fast, extensible POP3 server
SYNOPSIS
tpop3d -h | [ -f file ] [ -p file ] [ -dvP ]
DESCRIPTION
tpop3d is a server which implements the RFC1939 POP3 pro-
tocol, including UIDL support. tpop3d supports virtual
domain authentication via a number of mechanisms, POP-
before-SMTP relaying, TCP wrappers, Maildir mailboxes and
various other useful features. It is a daemon which waits
in the background and accepts incoming connections. It
cannot be operated from inetd(8).
tpop3d logs most diagnostics via syslog(3), using facility
mail or another which is defined in its configuration
file.
Detailed control over the operation of tpop3d is exercised
by editing its configuration file, by default
/etc/tpop3d.conf. See the manual entry for tpop3d.conf(5)
for more information.
OPTIONS
-h Print a summary of usage and the compile-time
options of this tpop3d.
-f file
Read configuration from file, instead of from
/etc/tpop3d.conf.
-p file
Write the PID of the server process to file. By
default, no PID file is written.
-d Do not fork to become a daemon, but stay attached
to a controlling terminal and print log messages to
standard error as well as the syslog
-v Log traffic being sent to/from the server, for
debugging purposes; tpop3d will log commands and
responses sent, but not passwords or the actual
content of messages.
-P If tpop3d is compiled with TLS support, and is con-
figured to use a key protected by a passphrase,
tpop3d will wait to read the passphrase at startup.
Do not use this option when starting tpop3d from a
boot script; it might wait forever for input on the
console.
SIGNALS
SIGTERM, SIGINT
Cause the daemon to exit, closing any active con-
nections.
SIGHUP Cause the daemon to restart, re-reading its config-
uration file. This will not close active connec-
tions which have already been authenticated.
other signals
Most other signals are ignored, though some
(SIGSEGV etc.) will cause the daemon to terminate
prematurely. In these circumstances, tpop3d should
clear up all of its lock files. However, if this
happens, it indicates either a bug in tpop3d, or a
hardware problem. In the former case, please con-
tact me (see below for contact details) with infor-
mation about your configuration and (if known)
steps which may be taken to reproduce the bug. In
particular, the configuration options which you
used to compile tpop3d and the operating system and
version under which you are running it are essen-
tial information for a bug report.
BUGS
Locking of mailspools under Unix is problematic, mostly
because of past brokenness which has now been fixed.
tpop3d's locking scheme should suffice in most cases (and
should work reliably over NFS) but it is naive: it locks
the mailspool for exclusive access, so that an MTA cannot
deliver mail to the mailspool whilst it is being accessed
by a tpop3d user. As a result, it is configured by default
to time out users rather rapidly (after 30s of inactiv-
ity). This is one of several places where it is marginally
noncompliant with RFC1939. Note that the locking issues do
not apply to maildir mailboxes.
Authentication drivers block the main daemon; this means
that a failure in NIS or an external program could prevent
tpop3d from handling new connections. A future version may
support asynchronous authentication drivers.
If TCP Wrappers support is enabled, then reverse-DNS reso-
lution of connected client addresses may also block the
main daemon.
FILES
/etc/tpop3d.conf
SEE ALSO
tpop3d.conf(5), exim(8), inetd(8), syslog(3), mysql(1),
TPOP3D::AuthDriver(1), RFC1939,
http://www.ex-parrot.com/~chris/tpop3d/,
http://www.ex-parrot.com/~chris/vmail-sql/,
http://www.mysql.com/,
http://lists.beasts.org/pipermail/tpop3d-discuss/.
AUTHOR
Chris Lightfoot <chris@ex-parrot.com>. Portions by Mark
Longair and Paul Makepeace.
If you have a query about tpop3d, please do not send me
personal email. Instead, please send it to the tpop3d
mailing list, to which you can subscribe by sending an
email with the subject `subscribe' to
<tpop3d-discuss-request@lists.beasts.org>. There is a
mailing list archive at
http://lists.beasts.org/pipermail/tpop3d-discuss/.
VERSION
$Id: tpop3d.8,v 1.16 2003/08/21 15:51:57 chris Exp $
COPYING
This program is free software; you can redistribute it
and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public
License as published by the Free Software Foundation;
either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any
later version.
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be
useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied
warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR
PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more
details.
You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public
License along with this program; if not, write to the Free
Software Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA
02139, USA.
TPOP3D(8)