Differences between revisions 2 and 13 (spanning 11 versions)

This page describes how to use Procmail to filter mail. It includes HCoop-specific instructions and a sample .procmail.d/procmailrc file with comments.

Introduction

Procmail instructions are kept in the ~/.procmail.d/procmailrc file. You should have a directory under your home AFS directory called .procmail.d. To activate procmail, simply create a file in that directory called procmailrc.

Since we like to document by means of an example, the remainder of these instructions focus on two specific example ~/.procmail.d/procmailrc files.

What do these examples do?

Separates mail into different folders based on who it is from or who it is addressed to.
If an email message did not get checked by the central spamassassin daemon, make sure it gets checked. It calls the client program instead of starting another spamassassin process. Most messages have already been checked -- these we don't touch. Occasionally spamassassin misses checking a message or two, somehow.

What do these examples not do?

Force spam checking with a custom set of rules. The admins do not recommend checking spam with custom rules, since it causes spamassassin to be invoked twice for each message.
This file can be split into smaller task-based files, but this is not done in the example.

Example 1: MichaelOlson's setup

# Example procmailrc filters
#
# We use a maildir here at hcoop.net
MAILDIR=$HOME/Maildir
DEFAULT=$MAILDIR/

# If you want to keep track of where mail has been delivered,
# uncomment this.  If enabled, be sure to trim this file once
# in a while (using cron is one way), because otherwise it can
# grow quite large.  It is strongly recommended to use the
# path given here, so that the logs gets placed in a writable
# location.
#LOGFILE=$HOME/.logs/mail/procmail.log

# See the manpages `procmailrc' and `procmailex' for explanations
# of the syntax involved.

# The following 2 rules come before the spam rules because we
# want to make sure that email from these people get through.
# It's a form of whitelisting.

# Stuff from the family
:0
* ^From.*(familymember1@msn|familymember2@yahoo)
.Family/

# Work-related
:0
* ^From.*person@somecollege
.Work/

# If mail hasn't been put through spamassassin, do so now
:0 fW
* !^X-Spam-Level:
| spamc

# All mail tagged as spam (eg. with a score higher than the set
# threshold) is definitely spam.
:0
* ^X-Spam-Status: Yes
.Spam.Definitely/

# If it scores 3 or better, it's probably spam.
:0
* ^X-Spam-Level: \*\*\*
.Spam.Probably/

# The Debian Bug-Tracking System forwards me a copy of each bug report
# I send in.  Since I don't already have a copy of this report, put it
# in my Sent box.
:0
* ^From:.*me@hcoop\.net
* ^To:.*submit@bugs\.debian\.org
.Sent/

# Local mail (error messages and the like)
:0
* ^(To:|From).*local\.domain\.org
.Local/

# Vending stuff
:0
* ^To:.*me(\+|_)vending@domain\.org
.Vending/

# School-related
:0
* ^To:.*me\+school@domain\.org
.School/

# Crap sent to all students
:0
* ^(To|Cc):.*[Rr]-[Uu]sers_
.Spam.Ignore/

# Bug reports
:0
* ^(From|To|C[c]):.*(bugs\.debian\.org|bugzilla\.)
.Bugs/

# LifeReader mailing list
:0
* ^(From|To|C[c]):.*liferea-devel@lists
.Lists.LifeRea/

# Neki_Fujiyama (Samurai Pizza Cats) list
:0
* ^(From|To|C[c]):.*[Nn]eko_[Ff]ujiyama@yahoogroups
.Lists.Neko_Fujiyama/

# Hcoop mailing list
:0
* ^To:.*users@hcoop
.Lists.HCoop/

# InfoWorld newsletters
:0
* ^From.*@newsletter\.infoworld
.Lists/

# Other lists
:0
* ^(From|To|C[c]):.*(@lists\.|@yahoogroups)
.Lists/

# Anything I've sent should go to Test
:0
* ^From:.*(mwolson@|@mwolson\.org)
.Test/

Example 2: JustinLeitgeb's setup

I based my .procmailrc on the file above. However, I don't trust my procmail coding skills, so I had procmail create a log file of the messages that it receives, as well as a backup copy of each message for testing purposes. I also decided that the "Sender:" field is the best one to use for the lists that I receive, so I filter on this field. I took code in my .procmailrc from the "procmailex" man page, which I highly recommend.

I created the directory "log" in my home directory for the log file before putting the .procmailrc in place. I also created the folders to which mail would be filtered in thunderbird, although I'm not absolutely sure if this step is necessary.

Note that you should probably comment out the "backup" section once you're sure that your code works in order to save space. You will also have to rotate or truncate the procmail log file manually, or write a script for cron to use.

{{{## JustinLeitgeb .procmailrc

# We use a maildir here at hcoop.net MAILDIR=$HOME/Maildir DEFAULT=$MAILDIR/

# Create a log file LOGFILE=$HOME/.logs/mail/procmail.log

# Make a backup of all mail that we'll wipe out when we're sure that # filtering is working correctly. :0 c .backup/

# CFP (call for papers) list :0 * ^Sender.*owner-cfp@lists.sas.upenn.edu .lists.CFP/

# plone-users :0 * ^Sender.*plone-users-bounces@lists.sourceforge.net .lists.plone-users/

# nflug :0 * ^Sender.*nflug-bounces@nflug.org .lists.nflug/}}}

-  ⇤ ← Revision 2 as of 2007-04-15 13:15:51 → 
  Size: 5122
  Editor: JustinLeitgeb
  Comment: added section on my own .procmailrc
+   ← Revision 13 as of 2007-11-01 20:04:40 → ⇥
  Size: 5484
  Editor: MichaelOlson
  Comment: Flesh out
-Deletions are marked like this.
+Additions are marked like this.
 Line 1:
-This page has a sample {{{.procmailrc}}} file with comments.  You
should use either a {{{.procmailrc}}} file or a {{{.forward}}} file,
but not both.
+#pragma section-numbers off
-Line 5:
+Line 3:
-= Which should I use? =
+This page describes how to use Procmail to filter mail.  It includes HCoop-specific instructions and a sample {{{.procmail.d/procmailrc}}} file with comments.
-Line 7:
+Line 5:
-If you simply want to send mail to another email address, using a
{{{.forward}}} file is your best bet.
+[[TableOfContents]]
-Line 10:
+Line 7:
-If you want to exercise control over your email by splitting it into
various mailboxes or (in our case) IMAP folders based on custom
criteria using the power of regexps, perhaps a {{{.procmail}}} file
would be best for you.
+= Introduction =
-Line 15:
+Line 9:
-= What does this file do? =
+Procmail instructions are kept in the {{{~/.procmail.d/procmailrc}}} file.  You should have a directory under your home AFS directory called {{{.procmail.d}}}.  To activate procmail, simply create a file in that directory called {{{procmailrc}}}.

Since we like to document by means of an example, the remainder of these instructions focus on two specific example {{{~/.procmail.d/procmailrc}}} files.

= What do these examples do? =
-Line 20:
+Line 18:
-= What does this file not do? =
+= What do these examples not do? =
-Line 25:
+Line 23:
-Take a look at {{{/home/mwolson/.procmailrc}}} and the
{{{/home/mwolson/procmail.d}}} directory for a procmail configuration
that is composed of several smaller files.

= Example file =
+= Example 1: MichaelOlson's setup =
-Line 37:
+Line 31:
+# If you want to keep track of where mail has been delivered,
# uncomment this.  If enabled, be sure to trim this file once
# in a while (using cron is one way), because otherwise it can
# grow quite large.  It is strongly recommended to use the
# path given here, so that the logs gets placed in a writable
# location.
#LOGFILE=$HOME/.logs/mail/procmail.log
-Line 46:
+Line 48:
-:0:
* ^From.*(olsonh@bethelcollege|rogero@saintjoe|risnerolson1@msn)
+:0
* ^From.*(familymember1@msn|familymember2@yahoo)
-Line 51:
+Line 53:
-:0:
* ^From.*(rodgerh|yodera)@bethelcollege
+:0
* ^From.*person@somecollege
-Line 62:
+Line 64:
-:0:
+:0
-Line 67:
+Line 69:
-:0:
+:0
-Line 74:
+Line 76:
-:0:
* ^From:.*mwolson@member\.fsf\.org
+:0
* ^From:.*me@hcoop\.net
-Line 80:
+Line 82:
-:0:
* ^(To:|From).*tuxtanker\.mwolson\.org
+:0
* ^(To:|From).*local\.domain\.org
-Line 85:
+Line 87:
-:0:
* ^To:.*me(\+|_)vending@mwolson\.org
+:0
* ^To:.*me(\+|_)vending@domain\.org
-Line 89:
+Line 91:
-# GNU related email
:0:
* ^To:.*(me\+gnu@mwolson\.org|mwolson@gnu\.org)
.Gnu/
-Line 95:
+Line 92:
-:0:
* ^To:.*me\+purdue@mwolson\.org
+:0
* ^To:.*me\+school@domain\.org
-Line 99:
+Line 96:
-# Crap sent to all Bethel students
:0:
+# Crap sent to all students
:0
-Line 105:
+Line 102:
-:0:
+:0
-Line 110:
+Line 107:
-:0:
+:0
-Line 115:
+Line 112:
-:0:
+:0
-Line 120:
+Line 117:
-:0:
+:0
-Line 125:
+Line 122:
-:0:
+:0
-Line 130:
+Line 127:
-:0:
+:0
-Line 135:
+Line 132:
-:0:
+:0
-Line 140:
+Line 137:
-= Another Example =
+= Example 2: JustinLeitgeb's setup =
-Line 145:
+Line 142:
+Note that you should probably comment out the "backup" section once you're sure that your code works in order to save space.  You will also have to rotate or truncate the procmail log file manually, or write a script for cron to use.
-Line 153:
+Line 152:
-# Create a log file in my home directory under "log", which will have to be 
# created manually.
LOGFILE=/home/leitgebj/log/procmail.log
+# Create a log file
LOGFILE=$HOME/.logs/mail/procmail.log
-Line 166:
+Line 164:
-:0:
+:0
-Line 171:
+Line 169:
-:0:
+:0
-Line 176:
+Line 174:
-:0:
+:0

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Diff for "MemberManual/Email/Procmail"

Introduction

What do these examples do?

What do these examples not do?

Example 1: MichaelOlson's setup

Example 2: JustinLeitgeb's setup