NAME¶

dovecot - a secure and highly configurable IMAP and POP3 server

SYNOPSIS¶

dovecot [-Fp] [-c config-file]
dovecot -a [-c config-file]
dovecot -n [-c config-file]
dovecot --build-options
dovecot --help
dovecot --version
dovecot reload
dovecot stop

DESCRIPTION¶

Dovecot is an open source IMAP and POP3 server for Linux/UNIX-like systems, written with security primarily in mind. Dovecot is an excellent choice for both small and large installations. It's fast, simple to set up, requires no special administration and it uses very little memory.

OPTIONS¶

-a

Dump all configuration settings to stdout and exit successfully. The same as doveconf -a.

-c config-file

Start dovecot with an alternative configuration.

-F

Run dovecot in foreground, do not daemonize.

-n

Dump non-default settings to stdout and exit successfully. The same as doveconf -n.

-p

Prompt for the ssl key password for the configured ssl_key on startup.

--build-options

Show Dovecot's build options and exit successfully.

--help

Print a usage message to stdout and exit successfully.

--version

Show Dovecot's version and exit successfully.

COMMANDS¶

reload

Force dovecot to reload its configuration.

stop

Shutdown dovecot and all its child processes.

When shutdown_clients is set to no, existing sessions will continue to use the old settings, after a dovecot reload. Also all sessions will keep alive after a dovecot stop.
By default all active sessions will be shut down.

SIGNALS¶

Dovecot handles the following signals as described:

HUP

Force dovecot to reload its configuration.

INT

Shutdown dovecot and all its child processes.

TERM

Shutdown dovecot and all its child processes.

USR1

Force dovecot to reopen all configured log files (log_path, info_log_path and debug_log_path).

The signals ALARM and PIPE are ignored.

FILES¶

/etc/dovecot/dovecot.conf

Dovecot's main configuration file.

/etc/dovecot/dovecot-ldap.conf.ext

Dovecot's LDAP authdb/userdb module configuration file.

/etc/dovecot/dovecot-sql.conf.ext

Dovecot's SQL authdb/userdb module configuration file.

/etc/dovecot/dovecot-dict-sql.conf.ext

Dovecot's dict configuration with SQL-backend.

/etc/dovecot/conf.d/auth-*-conf.ext

Configuration files of different authentication modules.

/etc/dovecot/conf.d/*.conf

Configuration files of different services and settings.

REPORTING BUGS¶

Report bugs, including doveconf -n output, to the Dovecot Mailing List <dovecot@dovecot.org>. Information about reporting bugs is available at: http://dovecot.org/bugreport.html

AUTHOR¶

Dovecot <http://dovecot.org> and its manual pages were written by the Dovecot authors <http://dovecot.org/doc/AUTHORS>, mainly Timo Sirainen <tss at iki.fi>, and are licensed under the terms of the MIT and LGPLv2.1 licenses, see <http://dovecot.org/doc/COPYING> for details.

SEE ALSO¶

doveadm(1), doveconf(1), dovecot-lda(1), dsync(1)