1FORWARD(5)                    File Formats Manual                   FORWARD(5)
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NAME

6       forward - email forwarding information file
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DESCRIPTION

9       Users may put a .forward file in their home directory.  If this file
10       exists, smtpd(8) forwards email to the destinations specified therein.
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12       A .forward file contains a list of expansion values, as described in
13       aliases(5).  Each expansion value should be on a line by itself.  How‐
14       ever, the .forward mechanism differs from the aliases mechanism in that
15       it disallows file inclusion (:include:) and it performs expansion under
16       the user ID of the .forward file owner.
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18       Permissions on the .forward file are very strict and expansion is
19       rejected if the file is group or world-writable; if the home directory
20       is group writeable; or if the file is not owned by the user.
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22       Users should avoid editing directly the .forward file to prevent deliv‐
23       ery failures from occurring if a message arrives while the file is not
24       fully written.  The best option is to use a temporary file and use the
25       mv(1) command to atomically overwrite the former .forward.  Alterna‐
26       tively, setting the sticky(8) bit on the home directory will cause the
27       .forward lookup to return a temporary failure, causing mails to be
28       deferred.
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FILES

31            ~/.forward
32                   Email forwarding information.
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EXAMPLES

35       The following file forwards mail to ``user@example.com'', and pipes the
36       same mail to ``examplemda''.
37           # empty lines are ignored
38           user@example.com    # anything after # is ignored
39           "|/path/to/examplemda"
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SEE ALSO

42       aliases(5), smtpd(8)
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46                          $Mdocdate: March 13 2015 $                FORWARD(5)
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