How do I mask "From" while using mailx

[Kent Ostby]

Hi folks --

I send a lot of email from the command line from one particular account using something like:

mailx -s "Subject" you@yourcompany.com < inputfile

I'd like to change it so that account ALWAYS uses a different "from" address (Its a ServiceGuard package and I want the return email to come to name of the package not the name of the machine its running on).

If there isn't a way to change this for the whole user account then I'd like to know how to mask it using mailx (since thats what I use).

Thanks,

Oz

[Marcel Boogert_1]

Hi there,

mailx -s "Subject" -r me@mycompany.com you@yourcompany.com < inputfile

This should solve your problem.

MB.

[Geoff Wild]

You could do this globaly, by setting the DM macro in /etc/mail/sendmail.cf

DMyourdomain.com

Which will then have a from address of user@yourdomain.com instead of user@machine.yourdomain.com


Rgds...Geoff

[RAC_1]

Check -r option for mailx.
Also check DM macro in sendmail.cf.

Anil

[Geoff Wild]

Just checked the man page - use -r

mailx -s "test" -r me@somewhere.com gwild
Rgds...Geoff

[Simon Hargrave]

You can use the -r option to pass the address.

If you want to be more complicated you can spoof: -

telnet mailserver 25
helo mydomain.com
mail from:brokenthing@serviceguard.com
rcpt to:admin@mydomain.com
data
Subject: It broke

It's all gone wrong
.
quit

[Simon Hargrave]

...as a midway option you can also append fields into the envelope. It's not foolproof though as the original will still be there, but the mail client should pick up the latest.

eg:-

cat <From: "Bill"
To: "Undisclosed Recipients"

I like my software, so there!
EOF

[Kent Ostby]

Is there a way to change it at the user level instead of the domain level in sendmail ?

[Rick Garland]

Are you using the same FROM address for all mails that originate from these SG systems?

How about setting the masquerade function.

[Jeff Gyurko]

I like the -F option of sendmail for this so I can actually put anything I want as the from like /usr/sbin/sendmail -bm -F "anything you want here" you@yourcompany.com

[Kent Ostby]

Rick --

No we're not using the same email for all users on the system.

[Rita C Workman · Accepted solution]

Here's a couple more little tricks for you:

If you want to change the FROM on a user only basis, say you want user imuser to go out Ima_User@mycompany.com you would:

Create /etc/mail/userdb file with the following:
imuser:mailname Ima_User
Ima_User:maildrop imuser

Now build the userdb.db file by running:
makemap btree /etc/mail/userdb.db < /etc/mail/userdb

Uncomment the following line in ~sendmail.cf file
0 UserDatabaseSpec=/etc/mail/userdb.db

Stop & Restart sendmail:
/sbin/init.d/sendmail stop
/sbin/init.d/sendmail start

And do a couple emails to test.
====================
Another thing you can 'play with' is the appearance of the contents /etc/passwd file,. Try editing via Sam or vipw the first line/part your real name. Have fun...

Rgrds,
Rita

[Denver Osborn]

what about aliasing mailx in that user's profile?

alias mailx="mailx -r `whoami`\@pkg_name"

-denver

[Kent Ostby]

Thanks for all the help everybody.

I will probably go with Denver's solution because its simple to implement but Rita's also matches what I'm looking for.

Best regards,

Kent M. ostby