SIEVE-TEST(1)SIEVE-TEST(1)NAMEsieve-test - Sieve script tester for the Dovecot secure IMAP server
SYNOPSISsieve-test [-c] [-d dump-file] [-e] [-f envelope-sender] [-l mail-loca‐
tion] [-m default-mailbox] [-r recipient-address] [-S script-file] [-t]
[-x "extension extension ..."] script-file mail-file
DESCRIPTION
The sieve-test command is part of the Sieve implementation for the
Dovecot secure IMAP server. Sieve (RFC 5228) is a simple and highly
extensible language for filtering e-mail messages. It can be imple‐
mented for any type of mail access protocol, mail architecture and
operating system. The language cannot execute external programs and in
its basic form it does not provide the means to cause infinite loops,
making it suitable for running securely on mail servers where mail
users have no permission run arbitrary programs.
Using the sieve-test command, the execution of Sieve scripts can be
tested. This evaluates the script for the provided message, yielding a
set of Sieve actions. Unless the -e option is specified, it does not
actually execute these actions, meaning that it does not store or for‐
ward the message anywere. In stead, it prints a detailed list of what
actions would normally take place. Note that, even when -e is speci‐
fied, no messages are ever transmitted to remote SMTP recipients. The
outgoing messages are printed to stdout in stead.
This is a very useful tool to debug the execution of Sieve scripts. It
can be used to verify newly installed scripts for the intended behav‐
iour and it can provide more detailed information about script execu‐
tion problems that are reported by the Sieve plugin.
The command has two mandatory arguments: the script-file argument,
which specifies the script to (compile and) execute, and the mail-file
argument, which specifies the file containing the e-mail message to
filter.
Note that this tool looks for a pre-compiled binary file with a .svbin
extension and with basename and path identical to the specified script.
Use the -c option to disable this behavior by forcing the script to be
compiled into a new binary.
OPTIONS-c Force compilation. By default, the compiled binary is stored on
disk. When this binary is found during the next execution of
sieve-test and its modification time is more recent than the
script file, it is used and the script is not compiled again.
This option forces the script to be compiled, thus ignoring any
present binary. Refer to sievec(1) for more information about
Sieve compilation.
-d dump-file
Causes a dump of the generated code to be written to the speci‐
fied file. This is identical to the dump produced by sieved(1).
Using '-' as filename causes the dump to be written to stdout.
-e Turns on true execution of the set of actions that results from
running the script. In combination with the -l parameter, the
actual delivery of messages can be tested. Note that this will
not transmit any messages to remote SMTP recipients. Such
actions only print the outgoing message to stdout.
-f envelope-sender
The envelope sender or return path. This is what Sieve's enve‐
lope test will compare to when the "from" envelope part is
requested. Also, this is where response messages are sent to.
-l mail-location
The location of the user's mail store. The syntax of this
option's mail-location parameter is identical to what is used
for the mail_location setting in the Dovecot config file. This
parameter is typically used in combination with -e to test the
actual delivery of messages. If -l is omitted when -e is speci‐
fied, mail store actions like fileinto and keep are skipped.
-m default-mailbox
The mailbox where the keep action stores the message. This is
"INBOX" by default.
-r recipient-address
The envelope recipient address. This is what Sieve's envelope
test will compare to when the "to" envelope part is requested.
Some tests and actions will also use this as the owner's e-mail
address.
-S script-file
Specify additional scripts to be executed before the main
script. Multiple -S arguments are allowed and the specified
scripts are executed sequentially in the order specified at the
command line.
-t Enable simple trace debugging; prints all encountered byte code
instructions to stdout. This is currently only intelligible for
developers.
-x "extension extension ..."
Set the available extensions. The parameter is a space-separated
list of the active extensions. By prepending the extension iden‐
tifiers with + or -, extensions can be included or excluded rel‐
ative to the default set of extensions. If no extensions have a
+ or - prefix, only those extensions that are explicitly listed
will be enabled. Unknown extensions are ignored and a warning is
produced. By default, all supported extensions are available,
except for deprecated extensions or those that are still under
development.
For example -x "+imapflags -enotify" will enable the deprecated
imapflags extension along with all extensions that are available
by default, except for the enotify extension.
DEBUG SUPPORT
To improve script debugging, the Sieve command line tools such as
sieve-test support a custom Sieve language extension called 'vnd.dove‐
cot.debug'. It adds the debug_print command that allows printing debug
messages to stdout.
Example:
require "vnd.dovecot.debug";
if header :contains "subject" "hello" {
debug_print "Subject header contains hello!";
}
Other tools like sievec and sieved also recognize the vnd.dovecot.debug
extension. In contrast, the actual Sieve plugin for the Dovecot LDA
does not allow the use of the debug extension. So, keep in mind that
scripts and compiled binaries that refer to de debug extension will
fail to be run by the Sieve plugin itself.
Note that it is not necessary to enable nor possible to disable the
availability of the debug extension with the -x option.
AUTHOR
The Sieve implementation for Dovecot was written by Stephan Bosch
<stephan@rename-it.nl>.
Dovecot was written by Timo Sirainen <tss@iki.fi>.
SEE ALSOsievec(1), sieved(1)
4 July 2009 SIEVE-TEST(1)
