# exim and aliases file

## whit

Been using a stock Gentoo exim for outgoing mail from a system for awhile. Now trying to set it up to handle incoming temporarily, but a test message to the system fails with the following in the mail.log:

Apr 27 12:03:51 free exim[16698]: 2003-04-27 12:03:51 199od5-0004LJ-00 == whit@obscuredomain.com R=system_aliases defer (-1): failed to expand "${lookup{$local_part}lsearch{SYSTEM_ALIASES_FILE}}": failed to open SYSTEM_ALIASES_FILE for linear search: No such file or directory

This confuses me since /etc/aliases does exist (as well as /etc/exim/aliases and /etc/mail/aliases - just to be sure). What is Gentoo's exim defaulting to for SYSTEM_ALIASES_FILE - a compile-time option, and I could look there of course, but have a lot else to do on deadline, so thought I'd ask  :Wink: 

Further note: Hardcoding it in exim.conf to:

```
data = ${lookup{$local_part}lsearch{/etc/aliases}}
```

 does work (along with setting access to /var/spool/mail so exim can get in) ... but it's not the "right" way, is it?

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## gkmac

 *whit wrote:*   

> Hardcoding it in exim.conf to:
> 
> ```
> data = ${lookup{$local_part}lsearch{/etc/aliases}}
> ```
> ...

 

The code above is what's in my exim.conf, but I cannot remember whether I put that in myself or whether it was part of the default exim.conf file.

 *whit wrote:*   

> but it's not the "right" way, is it?

 

I don't see why that is "wrong". That's been my aliases setup for several months with no side effects. /etc/aliases isn't going to move, so if that works you might as well leave it like that.

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## vgd

SYSTEM_ALIASES_FILE is actually supposed to be replaced with a path

The install script that comes with Exim src does this.

I have submitted an updated ebuild that sets it to /etc/mail/aliases

vgd

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## grobian

The ebuild simply took the wrong config file to install as exim.conf.dist, this is fixed now, thanks!

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