Installing Exim Mail Service

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Abstract

This article describes the installation and configuration of exim as an alternative MTA to sendmail.


Table of Contents
Getting and Compiling Exim
Exim Configuration
Installing Exim as an Alternative to Sendmail
Testing Exim
References and Related Links

Getting and Compiling Exim

  1. Get the latest version of exim from http://www.exim.org/mirrors.html , e.g.:

    
bash$ wget ftp://ftp.csx.cam.ac.uk/pub/software/email/exim/exim4/exim-4.42.tar.gz .
    
    Get also the latest docs, e.g.:
    
bash$ wget ftp://ftp.csx.cam.ac.uk/pub/software/email/exim/exim4/exim-html-4.30.tar.gz .
    bash$ wget ftp://ftp.csx.cam.ac.uk/pub/software/email/exim/exim4/exim-html-4.30.tar.gz .
    

  2. Extract it in /usr/local/src/ :

    
bash# mv exim-*.tar.gz /usr/local/src/tgz/
    bash# cd /usr/local/src/
    bash# tar xfz tgz/exim-4.42.tar.gz
    bash# cd exim-4.42/
    

  3. Create Local/Makefile :

    
bash# cp src/EDITME Local/Makefile
    bash# vi Local/Makefile
    
    
BIN_DIRECTORY=/usr/local/exim/bin
    CONFIGURE_FILE=/usr/local/exim/exim.conf
    EXIM_USER=ref:mail
    SPOOL_DIRECTORY=/var/spool/exim
    SUPPORT_MAILDIR=yes
    # EXIM_MONITOR=eximon.bin
    LOG_FILE_PATH=/var/log/exim_%s.log
    USE_TCP_WRAPPERS=yes
    EXTRALIBS_EXIM=-lwrap -ldl
    

  4. Make sure that db4 and db4-devel packages are installed and install them if they aren't:

    
bash$ rpm -q db4
    bash$ rpm -q db4-devel
    bash# rpm -Uhv db4-....rpm
    bash# rpm -Uhv db4-devel-....rpm
    

  5. Compile and install:

    
bash$ make
    bash# make install