Flusing STDOUT?

+--- Philip Guenther wrote:
|
| Procmail expects actions to process the entire content sent to them.
| If they can't, procmail will flag an error.  It it was a filter then
| procmail will generally recover the original body (it can fail to do so
| under some rare circumstances, if I remember correctly).
|
| So, since the action of the filter, 'echo "foo"' didn't read the entire
| message, procmail assumed it failed.  To tell procmail that a write
| error is expected and ignorable, put the 'i' flag on the recipe:
| 
|        :0 fi
|        | echo foo

That kinda works :-)

Here's the base recipe I have now:

  LOGFILE=/var/log/procmail.log
  VERBOSE=on

  SHELL=/bin/sh
  SENDMAIL=/usr/lib/sendmail
  FORMAIL=/usr/local/bin/formail
  PATH=/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/ucb
  TEST=/usr/bin/test
  CAT=/usr/bin/cat
  TRUE=/bin/true
  FALSE=/bin/false

  DEFAULT=$HOME/Maildir/

  DROPPRIVS=yes

  :0
   {
    EXITCODE=69

    :0 wif                          # recipe 1.1
    *?$CONDITION
    |echo "\n" \
          "+------------+\n" \
          "| A message. |\n" \
          "+------------+\n";

    :0 wr                          # recipe 1.2
    *?$CONDITION
    |
   }

  :0
   {
    EXITCODE=0

    :0
    $DEFAULT
   }

We are observing rather strange behavior here, and suspect flushing may
be the problem.  The idea is that $CONDITION is some external program which 
tests something, and returns 0 upon success, 1 otherwise (we've been using
true and false for testing).

Assume that recipe 1.1 returns true: we should see "A message" come out via
STDOUT.  This only happens if:

  a) recipe 1.2 is present
  b) recipe 1.2 is is true as well.

If recipe 1.1 is false but 1.2 is true, we see the message (as expected).

In order for recipe 2.1 to happen, both 1.1 and 1.2 must be false, or 1.2
must be missing. 

What makes no sense is that if recipe 1.2 is not present (we really don't 
need it), recipe 1.1 does not even happen:

Test case (1):

 * procmailrc:

   LOGFILE=/var/log/procmail.log
   VERBOSE=on

   SHELL=/bin/sh
   SENDMAIL=/usr/lib/sendmail
   FORMAIL=/usr/local/bin/formail
   PATH=/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/ucb
   TEST=/usr/bin/test
   CAT=/usr/bin/cat
   TRUE=/bin/true
   FALSE=/bin/false

   CONDITION=/bin/true

   DEFAULT=$HOME/Maildir/

   DROPPRIVS=yes

   :0
    {
     EXITCODE=69

     :0 wif
     *?$CONDITION
     |echo "\n" \
           "+------------+\n" \
           "| A message. |\n" \
           "+------------+\n";
    }

   :0
    {
     EXITCODE=0

     :0
     $DEFAULT
    }

 * dry run:

   root(_at_)blah:~# procmail -d foobar < /tmp/message
   root(_at_)blah:~# echo $?
   0
   root(_at_)blah:~# 


 * log:

   procmail: [25113] Tue Mar  9 00:46:21 1999
   procmail: Assigning "SHELL=/bin/sh"
   procmail: Assigning "SENDMAIL=/usr/lib/sendmail"
   procmail: Assigning "FORMAIL=/usr/local/bin/formail"
   procmail: Assigning "PATH=/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/ucb"
   procmail: Assigning "TEST=/usr/bin/test"
   procmail: Assigning "CAT=/usr/bin/cat"
   procmail: Assigning "TRUE=/bin/true"
   procmail: Assigning "FALSE=/bin/false"
   procmail: Assigning "CONDITION=/bin/true"
   procmail: Assigning "DEFAULT=/home/foobar/Maildir/"
   procmail: Assigning "DROPPRIVS=yes"
   procmail: Assuming identity of the recipient, VERBOSE=off
     Folder: /home/foobar/Maildir//tmp/920958381.25113.blah                  50

 * huh?

   If $CONDITION is set to /bin/true, and therefore meets the condition of
   recipe 1.1, why is the recipe ignored?



Test case (2)

 * procmailrc:

   LOGFILE=/var/log/procmail.log
   VERBOSE=on

   SHELL=/bin/sh
   SENDMAIL=/usr/lib/sendmail
   FORMAIL=/usr/local/bin/formail
   PATH=/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/ucb
   TEST=/usr/bin/test
   CAT=/usr/bin/cat
   TRUE=/bin/true
   FALSE=/bin/false

   CONDITION=/bin/true

   DEFAULT=$HOME/Maildir/

   DROPPRIVS=yes

   :0
    {
     EXITCODE=69

     :0 wif
     *?$CONDITION
     |echo "\n" \
           "+------------+\n" \
           "| A message. |\n" \
           "+------------+\n";

     :0 wif
     *?$CONDITION
     |
    }

   :0
    {
     EXITCODE=0

     :0
     $DEFAULT
    }

 * dry run:

   root(_at_)blah:~# procmail -d foobar < /tmp/message

    +------------+
    | A message. |
    +------------+

   root(_at_)blah:~# echo $?
   69
   root(_at_)blah:~# 

 * log file:

   procmail: [25120] Tue Mar  9 00:50:58 1999
   procmail: Assigning "SHELL=/bin/sh"
   procmail: Assigning "SENDMAIL=/usr/lib/sendmail"
   procmail: Assigning "FORMAIL=/usr/local/bin/formail"
   procmail: Assigning "PATH=/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/ucb"
   procmail: Assigning "TEST=/usr/bin/test"
   procmail: Assigning "CAT=/usr/bin/cat"
   procmail: Assigning "TRUE=/bin/true"
   procmail: Assigning "FALSE=/bin/false"
   procmail: Assigning "CONDITION=/bin/true"
   procmail: Assigning "DEFAULT=/home/foobar/Maildir/"
   procmail: Assigning "DROPPRIVS=yes"
   procmail: Assuming identity of the recipient, VERBOSE=off
     Folder: |                                                                  
50

 * huh?

   Why does recipe 1.2 have to present _and_ be true in order for 1.1 to happen?
   Only an "|" in recipe 1.2 will generate this behavior. Adding an | echo foo
   will result in the same behavior as in test (1).

This is procmail3.11-pre7 with Maildir patches; 3.12 displays the same behavior
with respect to the recipes. This runs on a Solaris 2.6 box with sendmail 8.9.3.

The intent here is to have bounces have a meaningful message attached to them
via sendmail upon testing the condition. If the the condition is false, then
delivery should proceed normally.

Thanks in advance.

Gerir