# sendmail !



## teo (Sep 18, 2021)

What is sendmail for and how to disable it completely?


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## shkhln (Sep 18, 2021)

See https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/mail#Noun and https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/send#Verb.


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## Alexander88207 (Sep 18, 2021)

teo said:


> What is sendmail for and how to disable it completely?



Hello teo,

add `sendmail_enable="NONE"` to /etc/rc.conf and sendmail()  should no longer start.


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## Tieks (Sep 18, 2021)

See `man rc.sendmail` on how to disable it completely.


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## zirias@ (Sep 18, 2021)

teo said:


> What is sendmail for


It's a full featured MTA (mail transport agent), and a very old and traditional one. For a working Unix system, you need *some* mail functionality, at the very least local delivery. FreeBSD has added dma (dragonfly mail agent) a while ago as a light-weight alternative.


teo said:


> how to disable it completely?


See https://docs.freebsd.org/en/books/handbook/mail/#mail-disable-sendmail

If you want to avoid installing it, as of now, you'd have to build the system yourself and have a look at src.conf(5).


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