-bv Verify: don??™t collect or deliver.
-bz Freeze the configuration file (obsolete).
Table 1-3. Other names for sendmail
Name Form Description
hoststat -bh Print persistent host status.
mailq -bp Display the queue.
newaliases -bi Initialize alias database.
purgestat -bH Purge persistent host status.
smtpd -bd Run as a daemon.
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20 | Chapter 1: Some Basics
1.7.1.2 Daemon mode (-bd)
The sendmail program can run as a daemon in the background, listening for incoming
mail from other machines. The sendmail program reads its configuration file only
once, when it first starts as a daemon. It then continues to run forever, never reading
the configuration file again. As a consequence, it will never see any changes to that
configuration file.
Thus, when you change something in the sendmail.cf configuration file, you always
need to kill and restart the sendmail daemon. But before you can kill the daemon,
you need to know how to correctly restart it. This information is in the /var/run/sendmail.
pid file or one of your system rc files.
On a Berkeley Unix-based system, for example, the daemon is usually started like
this:
/usr/sbin/sendmail -bd -q1h
The -bd command-line switchspecifies daemon mode. The -q switchtells sendmail
how often to look in its queue to process pending mail.
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