SRS support

[moonsoftsystems]

SRS support this is VITAL, people generally have their mail forwarded to a gmail or yahoo account because they are used to checking THAT. If you are implementing SPF and forwarding mail, you will find that forwarding is BROKEN! We need Cpanel to deploy SRS support for EXIM it's really not that hard... but since Cpanel has taken control of EXIM then you can't do this currently on a Cpanel server, and definately not unless you are an admin or dev..

Please add this make it recommended for people using SPF, besides MOST people out there configuring SPF don't know what they are doing and deserve a "little" help

[cPanelDon]

SRS support this is VITAL, people generally have their mail forwarded to a gmail or yahoo account because they are used to checking THAT. If you are implementing SPF and forwarding mail, you will find that forwarding is BROKEN! We need Cpanel to deploy SRS support for EXIM it's really not that hard... but since Cpanel has taken control of EXIM then you can't do this currently on a Cpanel server, and definately not unless you are an admin or dev..

Please add this make it recommended for people using SPF, besides MOST people out there configuring SPF don't know what they are doing and deserve a "little" help

The above feature request was split from the following thread to ensure minimal confusion between multiple requests, better organized discussion and maximum attention for posted ideas: Cpanel and EXIM Let's fix this!!! - cPanel Forums

[cPanelDon]

Please note that at the time of writing Exim SRS support is still experimental according to the official Exim web site.

Reference: SRS - Exim Wiki

Related internal case ID number: #4241

[cpanelkenneth]

The Exim RMP provided by cPanel has supported SRS since April 2008. You may confirm this via the following command:

root@huxley [~]# /usr/sbin/exim -bV
Exim version 4.69 #1 built 16-Mar-2009 14:47:06
Copyright (c) University of Cambridge 2006
Berkeley DB: Sleepycat Software: Berkeley DB 4.3.29: (January  7, 2007)
Support for: crypteq iconv() IPv6 PAM Perl OpenSSL Content_Scanning Old_Demime Experimental_SPF Experimental_SRS Experimental_DomainKeys Experimental_DKIM
Lookups: lsearch wildlsearch nwildlsearch iplsearch dbm dbmnz passwd
Authenticators: cram_md5 dovecot plaintext spa
Routers: accept dnslookup ipliteral manualroute queryprogram redirect
Transports: appendfile/maildir autoreply pipe smtp
Size of off_t: 8
Configuration file is /etc/exim.conf

The implementation uses libsrs_alt as found at libsrs_alt :: Home

The configuration of SRS is left up to the system admin.

[wemail]

SRS support this is VITAL, people generally have their mail forwarded to a gmail or yahoo account because they are used to checking THAT. If you are implementing SPF and forwarding mail, you will find that forwarding is BROKEN! We need Cpanel to deploy SRS support for EXIM it's really not that hard... but since Cpanel has taken control of EXIM then you can't do this currently on a Cpanel server, and definately not unless you are an admin or dev..

Please add this make it recommended for people using SPF, besides MOST people out there configuring SPF don't know what they are doing and deserve a "little" help

...The configuration of SRS is left up to the system admin.

The problem is that by leaving SRS configuration to sysadmins, you are not helping these people who are not sure HOW to configure it! I think the gist of these enquiries is that some more cPanel involvement in the configuration, or more detailed explicit guidance of some sort is called for.

[jdfalk]

SRS support this is VITAL, people generally have their mail forwarded to a gmail or yahoo account because they are used to checking THAT.

True, but neither Gmail nor Yahoo! Mail check SRS, so this won't help.

MAAWG, which includes representatives from most of the big ISPs, published a list of recommendations for forwarders a couple years ago:

http://www.maawg.org/about/published...warding_BP.pdf

cPanel is in a good position to make those recommendations easier for many sites to implement.

[AlanH]

more detailed explicit guidance of some sort is called for.

It would certainly be appreciated as I have clients who are using mail forwarding where the original sender uses SPF and has set "-all" so when their email is forwarded it then fails SPF lookup at the final destination and is not delivered. For example, this bit me today on a new server I was configuring. Globalsign.com use "-all" in their SPF and an SSL certificate activation email didn't arrive because I had SPF checks running on the destination and had forwarded the email using a forwarder within cPanel. The servers are now mutually whitelisted but it illustrates the issue my clients have been having rather well.

So, I've done a fair bit of background Googling on this now and have found the generic info there is out there. I can see I need the following in the exim.conf...

In the global section...
hide srs_config = somesecret:30:6

I then need to track down the routers responsible for forwarding and add
srs = forward

...at which point all the example start look rather different from the cpanel exim.conf file.

Then I need to add in an srs_router - at which point I scurry off to look for the Exim manual.

Now, I'm sure that, given long enough with an Exim manual and a server to play with, I'll be able to get it working but if someone has already got it working on cPanel and could give a walkthrough, that would be great.

Now, I know about losing all the changes whenever exim.conf is rebuilt and can work with that for now until the cPanel team provide an easy to use checkbox in WHM

[cPanelDon]

Now, I know about losing all the changes whenever exim.conf is rebuilt and can work with that for now until the cPanel team provide an easy to use checkbox in WHM

To safely edit directives in the Exim configuration file "exim.conf" and ensure the custom changes are retained I recommend using the Advanced Exim Configuration Editor in WHM via the following menu path: WHM: Main >> Service Configuration >> Exim Configuration Editor >> Advanced Editor

[AlanH]

To safely edit directives in the Exim configuration file "exim.conf" and ensure the custom changes are retained I recommend using the Advanced Exim Configuration Editor in WHM

Thanks for the response Don. If it's possible to make the necessary changes by using just the input areas in the interface, I will certainly be going down that route. I get the impression that some of the changes may be to areas of the original config file not open to editing - but I could be wrong. I haven't got far enough into the manual yet

[mykkal]

Cpanel does an awesome job at integrating their software. The reason i use it is because it makes complex tasks easy. I think a user friendly interface for SRS would be wonderful.

Especially because a feature like this will inevitably drive more people to use cpanel.

[jack01]

We are trying to test the example SRS implentation from SRS - Exim Wiki

Can someone please clarify what should actually be used for "data =" in the "forwarding_router" section:

forwarding_router:
  driver = redirect
  srs = forward
  data = ${lookup ...}

srs_router:
  driver = redirect
  srs = reverseandforward
  data = ${srs_recipient}

Would it be this? :

data = ${lookup{$domain}}

It would also be useful to get clarification on exactly which edit box the above snippets should be added to using WHM advanced exim.conf editor.

Thanks for any feedback

[SoftDux]

So what exactly does SRS do, what we need it so badly?

[AlanH]

So what exactly does SRS do, what we need it so badly?

It does this...

http://www.libsrs2.org/srs/srs.pdf

[cPanelDavidG]

It does this...

http://www.libsrs2.org/srs/srs.pdf

Can you summarize that for us, especially why it is so desperately needed?

[AlanH]

Can you summarize that for us, especially why it is so desperately needed?

If you look back to post #7, I already summarized the issue based on my experience. Basically, it's needed because a combination of forwarding and SPF, both features of cPanel, can easily result in 'lost' email. Therefore, an easy way to implement SRS would be very useful for anyone who uses mail forwarders on cPanel (probably the vast majority of users?).

I'd agree with mykkal's comments:

Cpanel does an awesome job at integrating their software. The reason i use it is because it makes complex tasks easy. I think a user friendly interface for SRS would be wonderful.

Especially because a feature like this will inevitably drive more people to use cpanel.