Important Note For Users Upgrading From Earlier Versions -------------------------------------------------------- Due to major reliability shortcomings in the database support libraries other than DB_File, we now require that the DB_File module be installed to use SpamAssassin's Bayes rules. SpamAssassin will still work without DB_File installed, but the Bayes support will be disabled. If you install DB_File and wish to import old Bayes database data, each user with a Bayes db should run "sa-learn --import" to copy old entries from the other formats into a new DB_File file. Note For Users Upgrading From SpamAssassin 2.3x or 2.4x ------------------------------------------------------- SpamAssassin no longer includes code to handle local mail delivery, as it was not reliable enough, compared to procmail. So now, if you relied on spamassassin to write the mail into your mail folder, you'll have to change your setup to use procmail as detailed below. If you used spamassassin to filter your mail and then something else wrote it into a folder for you, then you should be fine. Support for versions of the optional Mail::Audit module before 1.9 is no longer included. The default mode of tagging (which used to be ***SPAM*** in the subject line) no longer takes place. Instead the message is rewritten. Using Razor version 1 is no longer supported. Please upgrade to Razor version 2 and also read the instructions located in the Razor2.patch file. Installing or Upgrading SpamAssassin ------------------------------------ The easiest way to do this is using CPAN.pm, like so: perl -MCPAN -e shell [as root] o conf prerequisites_policy ask install Mail::SpamAssassin quit On Debian, you can apt-get it from unstable, thanks to Duncan Findlay. Alternatively download the tarfile, zipfile or Red Hat RPM from http://spamassassin.org/ , and install that, like so: [unzip/untar the archive] cd Mail-SpamAssassin-* perl Makefile.PL [option: add -DSPAMC_SSL to $CFLAGS to build an SSL-enabled spamc] make make install [as root] To install as non-root, do something like this: [unzip/untar the archive] cd Mail-SpamAssassin-* perl Makefile.PL PREFIX=~/sausr SYSCONFDIR=~/saetc [option: add -DSPAMC_SSL to $CFLAGS to build an SSL-enabled spamc] make make install If you are running AFS, you may also need to specify INSTALLSITELIB and SITELIBEXP. This will install the SpamAssassin modules and rules below the ~/sausr and ~/saetc directories off your home directory. Please see the file PACKAGING, sections "Changing paths in the Makefile" and "Setting further options on the command line" for more informations on available command line variables. Note that you can upgrade SpamAssassin using these instructions, as long as you take care to read the caveats at the top of this file. Upgrading will not delete your learnt Bayes data or local rule modifications. SunOS Note ---------- Under SunOS, snprintf is not defined. A library containing a SunOS version of snprintf is included in contrib/snp.tar.gz, which is usable for building SA. Mike Nolan has built this, and here's his directions: I built SpamAssassin under SunOS 4.1.3. (...) % cd contrib % gtar xzf snp.tar.gz % cd snp % gmake libsnp.a OK, now go to the spamassassin directory, and compile: % cd .. % gcc -g -O2 spamd/spamc.c spamd/libspamc.c spamd/utils.c \ -o spamd/spamc -ldl -lnsl contrib/snp/libsnp.a -lm % gmake Now you have spamc and spamd. Note for Perl 5.8 Users (incl Red Hat 8) ---------------------------------------- Perl 5.8 now uses Unicode internally by default, which causes trouble for SpamAssassin (and almost all other reasonably complex pieces of perl code!). We've worked around this in most places, as far as we know, but there may still be some issues. In addition, there is a speed hit, which it would be nice to avoid. Setting the LANG environment variable before any invocation of SpamAssassin sometimes seems to help fix it, like so: export LANG=en_US Notably, the LANG setting must not include "utf8". However, some folks have reported that this makes no difference. ;) Installing SpamAssassin for Personal Use (Not System-Wide) ---------------------------------------------------------- These steps assume the following, so substitute as necessary: - Your UNIX login is "user" - Your home directory is /home/user - The location of the procmail executable is /usr/bin/procmail 1. Uncompress and extract the SpamAssassin archive, using "unzip" or "tar xvfz", in a temporary directory. 2. change directory into it: cd Mail-SpamAssassin-* 3. Make SpamAssassin as normal, but using your home directory as the target: perl Makefile.PL PREFIX=~/sausr SYSCONFDIR=~/saetc make make install Please see the file PACKAGING, sections "Changing paths in the Makefile" and "Setting further options on the command line" for more informations on available command line variables. 4. If you already use procmail, skip to step 6. If not, ensure procmail is installed using "which procmail" or install it from www.procmail.org. 5. Create a .forward file in your home directory containing the below lines: "|IFS=' ' && exec /usr/bin/procmail -f- || exit 75 #user" 6. Edit or create a .procmailrc file in your home directory containing the below lines. If you already have a .procmailrc file, add the lines to the top of your .procmailrc file: :0fw: spamassassin.lock | /home/user/sausr/bin/spamassassin The above line filters all incoming mail through SpamAssassin and tags probable spam with a unique header. If you would prefer to have spam blocked and saved to a file called "caughtspam" in your home directory, instead of passed through and tagged, append this directly below the above lines: :0: * ^X-Spam-Status: Yes caughtspam 7. Now, you should be ready to send some test emails and ensure everything works as expected. First, send yourself a test email that doesn't contain anything suspicious. You should receive it normally, but there will be a header containing "X-Spam-Status: No". If you are only tagging your spam, send yourself a copy of the GTUBE test string to check to be sure it is marked as spam. GTUBE is located in the sample-spam.txt message distributed with SpamAssassin and also at: http://www.spamassassin.org/gtube/ If your test emails don't get through to you, immediately rename your .forward file until you figure out cause of the the problem, so you don't lose incoming email. Required Modules ---------------- These modules are required for spamassassin to build: - ExtUtils::MakeMaker >= 5.45 (from CPAN, or included in Perl 5.6 and higher) The ExtUtils::MakeMaker module is required in version 5.45 or later. Without the proper version the build will fail to create the Makefile. This is included in Perl versions 5.6 and later. Version 6.16 or later is recommended. These modules are required for spamassassin to run: - File::Spec >= 0.8 (from CPAN, or included in Perl 5.6 and higher) The File::Spec module is required in version 0.8 (Mar 2000) or later. This is included in Perl versions 5.6 and later. - Pod::Usage >= 1.10 (from CPAN, or included in Perl 5.6 and higher) The Pod::Usage module is required. This is included in Perl versions 5.6 and later. The modules shipped with earlier versions are buggy and need to be upgraded. - HTML::Parser >= 3.24 (from CPAN) Version 3.29 or later is recommended. HTML is used for an ever-increasing amount of email so this dependency is unavoidable. Run "perldoc -q html" for additional information. If you use Debian, you can get HTML::Parser from the libhtml-parser-perl package. - Sys::Syslog (from CPAN) This is a required module if you use spamd. spamd logs information about scanned messages to syslog using this module. Note: perl versions 5.003_07 and later should have Sys::Syslog already installed. You can easily test this by running: perl -MSys::Syslog -e 1 If it generates an error, you need to install the module. If the command just returns, you should be ok. Optional Additional Modules --------------------------- In addition, the following modules will be used for some checks, if available. If they are not available, SpamAssassin will still work, just not as effectively -- some of the spam-detection tests will have to be skipped. - DB_File (from CPAN) Used to store data on-disk, for the Bayes-style logic and auto-whitelist. *Much* more efficient than the other standard Perl database packages. Strongly recommended. perl -MCPAN -e shell o conf prerequisites_policy ask install DB_File quit - Net::DNS (from CPAN) Used to check the RBL, RSS, DUL etc. and perform MX checks. Recommended. perl -MCPAN -e shell o conf prerequisites_policy ask install Net::DNS quit - Razor http://razor.sourceforge.net/ Used to check message signatures against Vipul's Razor collaborative filtering network. Razor is not available from CPAN -- you have to download it from the URL above. Razor has a large number of dependencies on CPAN modules. Feel free to skip installing it, if this makes you nervous; SpamAssassin will still work well without it. Note that Razor support does not seem to work on Windows systems. Win32 users should disable the Razor tests using "score RAZOR2_CHECK 0". You (and any users who use Razor) will need to register an account to do so, like this: # razor-client [creates symbolic links] # razor-admin -create [creates the razor home] # razor-admin -register [registers an account] If you want to use Razor and you are using Vipul's Razor 2.22 or higher (until at least 2.36), you need to apply a small patch to use Razor in "taint mode" which is now the default in SpamAssassin. The instructions are located in the Razor2.patch file. - DCC http://www.rhyolite.com/anti-spam/dcc/ DCC (Distributed Checksum Clearinghouse) is a system similar to Razor. It supports fuzzy checksums and therefore detects some more spams than Razor does at the moment. To install it, download http://www.rhyolite.com/anti-spam/dcc/source/dcc-dccproc.tar.Z and perform the following steps: # tar xfvz dcc-dccproc.tar.Z # cd dcc-dccproc-X.X.X # ./configure && make && make install # cdcc 'info' The last command will give some output. One line of it should contain something like: dcc.rhyolite.com,- RTT+0 ms anon Note that MIMEDefang users may need to set the 'dcc_path' configuration setting, since MIMEDefang does not set a PATH by default. - Pyzor http://pyzor.sourceforge.net/ Used to check message signatures against the Pyzor collaborative filtering network. Pyzor was initially "a Python implementation of Razor", but now also uses its own (free) server architecture and is "based upon a new, lighter, more language-independent protocol." Pyzor requires at least Python 2.2.1 which can be found at http://www.python.org/ . To install Pyzor, download the latest revision from https://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=50000 and perform the following steps: # bunzip2 pyzor-*.tar.bz2 # cd pyzor-* # python setup.py build # python setup.py install Note that your system might install the modules and scripts with non-world-readable permissions. Correct this with a command such as: # chmod -R a+rX /usr/share/doc/pyzor \ /usr/lib/python2.2/site-packages/pyzor \ /usr/bin/pyzor /usr/bin/pyzord Read the INSTALL document if you want to setup your own Pyzor server and signature store. Otherwise, you can just use the public servers. Note that MIMEDefang users may need to set the 'pyzor_path' configuration setting, since MIMEDefang does not set a PATH by default. - Mail::Audit, Mail::Internet, Net::SMTP (from CPAN) If you want to use SpamAssassin with Mail::Audit, you will (obviously) require the Mail::Audit module, and any modules it requires (there's lots of them, unfortunately). Additionally, Mail::Internet is required if you wish to use the "-r/-w" options of the spamassassin program (reporting and replying, for spam-trap mail accounts). If you use procmail, KMail, 'spamassassin', or you plan to use 'spamd', you will *not* need these. Here's how to install them using CPAN.pm: perl -MCPAN -e shell o conf prerequisites_policy ask install Mail::Audit quit - Digest::SHA1 (from CPAN) The Digest::SHA1 module will speed up some cryptographic hash tests, but is not required (although it may be required by another module). If you use Debian, you can get Digest::SHA1 from the libdigest-sha1-perl package. - Net::Ident (from CPAN) If you plan to use the --auth-ident option to spamd, you will need to install this module. - IO::Socket::SSL (from CPAN) If you wish to use SSL encryption to communicate between spamc and spamd (the --ssl option to spamd), you need to install this module. (You will need the OpenSSL libraries and use the ENABLE_SSL="yes" argument to Makefile.PL to build and run an SSL compatibile spamc.) What Next? ---------- Take a look at the USAGE document for more information on how to use SpamAssassin. (end of INSTALL) // vim:tw=74: