POSTALIAS(1)                                         POSTALIAS(1)

NAME
       postalias - Postfix alias database maintenance

SYNOPSIS
       postalias [-Nfinrvw] [-c config_dir] [-d key] [-q key]
       [file_type:]file_name ...

DESCRIPTION
       The postalias command creates or queries one or more Post-
       fix alias databases, or updates an existing one. The input
       and output file formats are expected to be compatible with
       Sendmail  version  8,  and are expected to be suitable for
       the use as NIS alias maps.

       While a database update is in progress, signal delivery is
       postponed,  and  an exclusive, advisory, lock is placed on
       the entire database, in order to avoid surprises in  spec-
       tator programs.

       Options:

       -N     Include  the terminating null character that termi-
              nates lookup keys and values. By  default,  Postfix
              does whatever is the default for the host operating
              system.

       -c config_dir
              Read the main.cf configuration file  in  the  named
              directory  instead  of  the  default  configuration
              directory.

       -d key Search the specified maps for key  and  remove  one
              entry  per  map.   The exit status is zero when the
              requested information was found.

              If a key value of - is specified, the program reads
              key values from the standard input stream. The exit
              status is zero when at least one of  the  requested
              keys was found.

       -f     Do not fold the lookup key to lower case while cre-
              ating or querying a map.

       -i     Incremental mode. Read entries from standard  input
              and  do  not  truncate  an  existing  database.  By
              default, postalias creates a new database from  the
              entries in file_name.

       -n     Don't  include  the terminating null character that
              terminates lookup  keys  and  values.  By  default,
              Postfix  does  whatever is the default for the host
              operating system.

       -q key Search the specified maps for  key  and  print  the
              first  value  found  on the standard output stream.
              The exit status is zero when the requested informa-
              tion was found.

              If a key value of - is specified, the program reads
              key values  from  the  standard  input  stream  and
              prints  one  line of key: value output for each key
              that was found. The exit status  is  zero  when  at
              least one of the requested keys was found.

       -r     When  updating a table, do not warn about duplicate
              entries; silently replace them.

       -v     Enable verbose logging for debugging purposes. Mul-
              tiple  -v  options  make  the software increasingly
              verbose.

       -w     When updating a table, do not warn about  duplicate
              entries; silently ignore them.

       Arguments:

       file_type
              The type of database to be produced.

              btree  The   output   is   a   btree   file,  named
                     file_name.db.  This  is  available  only  on
                     systems with support for db databases.

              dbm    The  output  consists  of  two  files, named
                     file_name.pag and  file_name.dir.   This  is
                     available  only  on systems with support for
                     dbm databases.

              hash   The  output  is   a   hashed   file,   named
                     file_name.db.   This  is  available  only on
                     systems with support for db databases.

              When no file_type is specified, the  software  uses
              the  database  type specified via the database_type
              configuration parameter.   The  default  value  for
              this parameter depends on the host environment.

       file_name
              The  name  of  the  alias database source file when
              rebuilding a database.

DIAGNOSTICS
       Problems are logged to the standard error stream. No  out-
       put means no problems were detected. Duplicate entries are
       skipped and are flagged with a warning.

       postalias terminates with zero exit status in case of suc-
       cess  (including  successful postmap -q lookup) and termi-
       nates with non-zero exit status in case of failure.

ENVIRONMENT
       MAIL_CONFIG
              Directory with Postfix configuration files.

       MAIL_VERBOSE
              Enable verbose logging for debugging purposes.

CONFIGURATION PARAMETERS
       The following main.cf parameters are  especially  relevant
       to  this  program. See the Postfix main.cf file for syntax
       details and for default values.

       database_type
              Default alias database type. On many UNIX  systems,
              the default type is either dbm or hash.

STANDARDS
       RFC 822 (ARPA Internet Text Messages)

SEE ALSO
       aliases(5) format of alias database input file.
       sendmail(1) mail posting and compatibility interface.

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

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