UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Currently have sendmail 8.6.? running on sunOS 5.7
(I only have remote access to the server)
- the sendmail.cf file says its a ultrix 4 build (I don't know why)
- got the new sendmail archive and extracted it to /usr/local/src/
- been reading the readme files, got the bat book, but...
still don't know where to start?

What files should backup during the install/update
(the server gets a full backup nightly, just want to know which
files/directories to keep close at hand... to lookup current info, etc.)

also, where to find step-by-step guide to updating sendmail for a newbie...

/usr/lib/sendmail
/etc/mail/*

Follow the INSTALL and insure you read the README's. Sendmail is a bear for the first few times - then it's like riding a bicycle (blindfolded ;-) .

As long as you have a good backup, do it - you can load it on a test box to check setting it up - better than messing with production.

when i invoke:
sendmail -d0.1 -bt < /dev/null

i get:
Version 8.9.1b+Sun
Compiled with: MAP_REGEX LOG MATCHGECOS MIME7TO8 MIME8TO7 NAMED_BIND
NDBM NETINET NETUNIX NEWDB NIS NISPLUS QUEUE SCANF SMTP USERDB
XDEBUG
============ SYSTEM IDENTITY (after readcf) ============
(short domain name) $w = mydomain.com
(canonical domain name) $j = $w
(subdomain name) $m = Web.
(node name) $k = mail.
========================================================
Warning: .cf file is out of date: sendmail 8.9.1b+Sun supports version 8, .cf file is version 5
hash map "Alias0": missing map file /etc/mail/aliases.db: No such file or directory
hash map "Alias0": missing map file /etc/mail/aliases.db: No such file or directory
ADDRESS TEST MODE (ruleset 3 NOT automatically invoked)
Enter <ruleset> <address>


there's alot of mismatch/stuff not right, so
my question is:
should i ftp get the sendmail 8.9.1 source and rebuild my .cf file,
or should i reinstall the new 8.12.3 version?

Someone kept the old sendmail.cf from version 5 instead of learning how to load sendmail properly. You can either find 8.9.1 or download one of the newer version of Sendmail and start from scratch.

Keep the old information (the files I mentioned before to backup).
Once you get the newer version up and running, you can check that it is close to what you need by checking the output from the sendmail -d0.1 -bt < /dev/null from both versions. Make sure the "Compiled with" options are the same, make sure the timeouts and other options in the sendmail.cf are the same.

You will have to read the README's (all of them) to insure you set this up correctly.

The alias file should be in /etc/mail/. You can enter the command newaliases if it is there and see if that builds your aliases.db.
Any aliases you have should be kept.