On Tue, Mar 03, 2020 at 04:46:11AM +0000, [email protected] wrote:
> Boudewijn,
> Thank you for your reply, and clarification.
>
> The man pages for SPAMD and SPAMDB do not directly state this relationship /
> behavior, and therefore I had made the assumption that spamd would capture
> and feed all entries into the spamdb, in all operational modes.
> ..hopefully i have not overlooked vital documentation.
>
hi.
there's a few parts to spamd, and i think it can be initially confusing
until you work out how it's put together. but there has been effort put
into the spamd(8) page to make it clear what happens by default, and how
that differs in blacklisting mode:
SPAMD(8) System Manager's Manual SPAMD(8)
...
When spamd is run in default mode, it will greylist
connections from new hosts. Depending on its configuration,
it may choose to blacklist the host or, if the checks
described below are met, eventually whitelist it. When
spamd is run in blacklist-only mode, using the -b flag, it
will consult a pre-defined set of blacklist addresses to
decide whether to tarpit the host or not.
...
When run in default mode, connections receive the pleasantly
innocuous temporary failure of:
451 Temporary failure, please try again later.
This happens in the SMTP dialogue immediately after the DATA
command is received from the client. spamd will use the db
file in /var/db/spamd to track these connections to spamd by
connecting IP address, HELO/EHLO, envelope-from, and
envelope-to, or tuple for short. Hosts which connect but do
not attempt to deliver mail will not generate a tuple and
always be ignored.
...
spamd-setup(8) should be run periodically by cron(8) to
update the blacklists configured in spamd.conf(5). Use
crontab(1) to uncomment the entry in root's crontab. When
run in blacklist-only mode, the -b flag should be specified.
...
BLACKLIST-ONLY MODE
When running in default mode, the pf.conf(5) rules described
above are sufficient. However when running in blacklist-
only mode, a slightly modified pf.conf(5) ruleset is
required, diverting any addresses found in the <spamd> table
to spamd. Any other addresses are passed to the real MTA.
...
/var/db/spamd Greylisting database.
i hope it's clear that /var/db/spamdb is used in default mode, but not in
blacklist-only mode.
jmc
