If the left part of a routing record contains an E-mail address in the
angle brackets (< and >), the record specifies an alias -
a routing rule for a specific address.
When an E-mail address is parsed and the Router scans the Table records,
it compares the address domain part with the domain part of all alias records met.
If the domain parts match, the Router compares the local part of the address with the
local part of the alias record address. The local part of the alias record address can
contain a wildcard symbol (*). If both domain and local parts match,
the right part of the
alias routing record is used as the new address. The Router restarts from the
beginning, parsing and processing this new address.
Note: Because the Server Main Domain Name in the parsed address is
immediately replaced with an empty string, alias records that should apply to
addresses in the Main Domain should not contain any domain part at all.
In the all examples below mycompany.com is the Server Main Domain name.
- Example:
- <sales> = Bill
in this case, all messages to sales@mycompany.com will go to Bill, as if
they were sent to Bill@mycompany.com
Note: if there is an alias for the local name xxxx,
there is no need to actually create a real xxxx Account on
the Server. Additionally, that Account would be useless, since no
message will ever be stored in that Account: everything directed to the
xxxx name is routed elsewhere.
Note: the Router Alias record:
- <sales@mycompany.com> = Bill
would never work: the alias records should NOT contain the name of the
Server Main Domain. To avoid problems with these records, the Server internally
removes the domain part from the left side of the alias records if that part is
the same as the Main Domain name.
The right side of an alias record can be any E-mail address.
- Example:
- <sales> = Bill@thatcompany.com
- All messages directed to sales@mycompany.com will be directed to Bill@thatcompany.com.
The Router takes the new address, extracts the domain name (thatcompany.com)
and local (Bill) parts, then the Router restarts trying to find a route to thatcompany.com.
You can use the wildcard symbol (*) in the local part of the alias records.
The same symbol can be used in any part of the right-side address to specify substring
substitution.
- Example:
- <dept-*> = postmaster@*-dept.mycompany.com
- This record will redirect all messages sent to dept-sales@mycompany.com
to the user postmaster at the sales-dept.mycompany.com department mail
server.
You can use Router Alias records to reroute mail sent to some of the your Server
Secondary Domains. In the following example, the client.com is a local Secondary Domain.
- Example:
- <sales@client.com> = Bill@client.com
- All messages directed to sales@client.com will be directed to Bill@client.com.
- Example:
- <sales@client.com> = Bill
- All messages directed to sales@client.com will be directed to Bill@mycompany.com (i.e.
to the address Bill in the Main Domain).
In most cases you do not have to use Router Alias Records: if you need
to provide an alternative name for an account in the main domain, use
Account Aliases instead. If you need to re-route all
mail sent to some name in a local domain to some external address, use
Forwarders instead.
Sometimes it is necessary to create an alias for a specific account
on a foreign system. For example, all mail sent to some domain should be
routed to a specific mail host or to a unified account, but certain accounts
in that domain should be routed to accounts on your or other systems.
- Example:
- <sales@client1.com> = sales-client1
client1.com = new.client1.com
- These records route all messages directed to the account sales at the
domain client1.com to the Account sales-client1 in your Server Main Domain, while messages
to all other accounts in the client1.com domain are routed to the new.client1.com
system.
The wildcard symbol (*) can be used only in the local part
of the full account name (i.e. it can be used before the @ sign).
You can use the wildcard feature to host several domains in one CommuniGate Pro Domain
creating a unique "address space" for each domain name.
- Example:
- <*@client5.com> = cl5-*
<*@client7.com> = cl7-*
Mail to sales@client5.com address will be stored on your server
in the cl5-sales Main Domain account, messages to info@client5.com address will be
stored in the cl5-info Main Domain account, while messages to sales@client7.com address
will be stored in the cl7-sales Main Domain account.
This method can be used when you do not want to create full-scale CommuniGate
Domains for many domains that should host 1-2 accounts.
