Installation

exim4 is a meta-package. exim4-base, exim4-daemon-light and exim4-config need to be installed.

Configuration

Configuration files

Exim's configuration file is located in /etc/exim4/exim4.conf.template (for unsplit configuration) or in files in /etc/exim4/conf.d. However, usually, this configuration file is not directly created by the Exim administrator, but generated from macros generated by the answers provided to Debconf during:

dpkg-reconfigure exim4-config

All answers provided to Debconf are stored in a simple shell script in /etc/exim4/update-exim4.conf.conf. Those answers are read by the script update-exim4.conf, and compiled into Exim4 macros provided in the exim4.conf.template configuration file for the Exim daemon. Lots of Exim documentation is provided in /usr/share/doc/exim4. It is worth to gunzip and read:

$ gzip -dc /usr/share/doc/exim4/README.Debian.gz | less

In /etc/email-addresses, specify the outgoing emails of users on the host:

user: someone@isp.com
otheruser: someoneelse@anotherisp.com

Exim and Gmail

See this: https://wiki.debian.org/GmailAndExim4 My /etc/exim4/update-exim4.conf.conf looks like this:

dc_eximconfig_configtype='smarthost'
dc_other_hostnames=''
dc_local_interfaces='127.0.0.1'
dc_readhost=''
dc_relay_domains=''
dc_minimaldns='false'
dc_relay_nets=''
dc_smarthost='smtp.gmail.com::587'
CFILEMODE='644'
dc_use_split_config='false'
dc_hide_mailname='false'
dc_mailname_in_oh='true'
dc_localdelivery='mail_spool'

Make sure to disable IPv6 at the beginning of the configuration file /etc/exim4/exim4.conf.template, for example just after the exim_path:

exim_path = /usr/sbin/exim4
disable_ipv6 = true

Provide Gmail credentials in /etc/exim4/passwd.client like this:

*.google.com:myname@gmail.com:mypassword
*.gmail.com:myname@fmail.com:mypassword

Note that specifying smtp*gmail.com:myname@gmail.com:mypassword does not work. Make sure the file is readable by the exim daemon:

sudo chown root:Debian-exim passwd.client
sudo chmod 640 passwd.client

Exim commands

To start exim,

/etc/init.d/exim4 restart

To reload the configuration of exim:

# update-exim4.conf
# invoke-rc.d exim4 restart

To force exim to try again to send messages, frozen or not:

exim -qff

To view the quantity of messages in the queue:

sudo exim4 -bpc

To list all messages in the queue:

sudo mailq

To view undelivered messages:

exim4 -bpu

To display some statistics on messages sent:

sudo exim4 -bp | eximqsumm

To delete frozen message:

mailq | grep 'frozen' | awk '{print $3}' | xargs exim4 -Mrm 

To view the current activity of Exim:

$ sudo eximwhat
11284 daemon: -q30m, listening for SMTP on [127.0.0.1]:25

To display the configuration exim uses:

exim4 -bV

To check if a given option is enabled or not:

$ exim -bP disable_ipv6
disable_ipv6

In the example above, IPv6 is disabled. If no_disable_ipv6 appears, IPv6 is not disabled. To understand why a given message is not routeable:

exim -d+route+resolver -v -M MESSAGE-ID

where the message id is something like 1WZ4qE-0005vb-JJ To send a test email:

echo "test message" | mail -s "subject" youremail@blah.com

Troubleshooting

Have a look at log files in /var/log/exim4/mainlog.

2014-04-18 22:18:58 1WbFFS-0005ro-Fj <= xxx@gmail.com U=user P=local S=488
2014-04-18 22:18:58 1WbFFS-0005ro-Fj == xxx@gmail.com R=smarthost
T=remote_smtp_smarthost defer (-53): retry time not reached for any host
2014-04-18 22:19:29 Start queue run: pid=22565 -qff
2014-04-18 22:21:37 1WbFFS-0005ro-Fj gmail-smtp-msa.l.google.com
[173.194.67.108] Connection timed out

That warning message states that Exim simply can't connect to gmail-smtp-msa.l.google.com. Make sure you are able to telnet the host on port 587 from the Exim host (in particular check there is no firewall that blocks the port).

SMTP error from remote mail server after MAIL FROM:<> SIZE=2730: host
gmail-smtp-msa.l.google.com [173.194.66.108]: 530-5.5.1 Authentication
Required. Learn more at\n530 5.5.1
http://support.google.com/mail/bin/answer.py?answer=14257

Make sure you have this in the password credential file:

*.google.com:myname@gmail.com:mypassword
 *.gmail.com:myname@fmail.com:mypassword

while checking a list: failed to open /etc/exim4/passwd.client for linear search: Permission denied (euid=111 egid=117)

Make sure /etc/exim4/passwd.client is accessible by the exim daemon.