SpamAssassin 3.0 Released

davemabe writes "At long last, SpamAssassin 3.0.0 has been released. I've been using the release candidates for a month or so, and the results have been far improved over previous versions. Its use of SURBL along with Bayes auto learning make it seem like this solution is the one to beat. It looks like they've introduced a new logo as well. Snazzy!"

Comments

SURBL

[alatesystems]

For those not in the know, SURBL is really cool. It actually lets you scan the message(well, SA does that) and then look for urls that it links to. It compares this to a realtime BL of other people getting spam like you and if it is a known spam TARGET url then it blocks the message based on that.

It makes it really hard for them unless they just register countless domains.

Excellent technology, and I will be upgrading to the newest stable.

Chris

3.0 New Features

[CleverFox]

Major feature list:

- SpamAssassin is now part of the Apache Software Foundation and has an
improved software license, the 2.0 version of the Apache License.

- SpamAssassin now includes support for SPF (the Sender Policy
Framework, http://spf.pobox.com/).

- Web site links contained in the message are checked against SURBL and
SBL. SURBL and SBL track sites that advertise with spam, known spam
sources, and spam services.

- The new 3.0 architecture allows third-parties to easily add plugin
modules.

- There is now SQL database support for both the Bayes and
auto-whitelist modules, allowing more large sites to easily deploy
SpamAssassin.

- A more accurate simulation of email client handling of MIME and HTML
improves our accuracy. In addition, there is better detection and
handling of spammer techniques that try to trick anti-spam software.

Important installation notes:

- The SpamAssassin 2.6x release series was the last set of releases to
officially support perl versions earlier than perl 5.6.1. If you are
using an earlier version of perl, you will need to upgrade before you
can use the 3.0.0 version of SpamAssassin.

- SpamAssassin 3.0.0 has a significantly different API (Application
Program Interface) from the 2.x series of code. This means that if
you use SpamAssassin through a third-party utility (milter, etc,) you
need to make sure you have an updated version which supports 3.0.0.

- The --auto-whitelist and -a options for "spamd" and "spamassassin" to
turn on the auto-whitelist have been removed and replaced by the
"use_auto_whitelist" configuration option which is also now turned on
by default.

- The "rewrite_subject" and "subject_tag" configuration options were
deprecated and are now removed. Instead, using "rewrite_header Subject
[your desired setting]". e.g.

rewrite_subject 1
subject_tag ****SPAM(_SCORE_)****

becomes

rewrite_header Subject ****SPAM(_SCORE_)****

- The Bayesian storage modules have been completely re-written and now
include Berkeley DB (DBM) storage as well as SQL based storage (see
sql/README.bayes for more information). In addition, a new format has
been introduced for the bayes database that stores tokens in fixed
length hashes. All DBM databases should be automatically converted to
this new format the first time they are opened for write. You can
manually perform the upgrade by running "sa-learn --sync" from the
command line.

The "sa-learn --rebuild" command has been deprecated; please use
"sa-learn --sync" instead. The --rebuild option will remain
temporarily for backwards compatibility.

- "spamd" now has a default max-children setting of 5; no more than 5
child scanner processes will be run in parallel. Previously, there
was no default limit unless you specified the "-m" switch when
starting spamd.

- If you are using a UNIX machine with all database files on local
disks, and no sharing of those databases across NFS filesystems, you
can use a more efficient, but non-NFS-safe, locking mechanism. Do
this by adding the line "lock_method flock" to the /etc/mail/spamassassin/local.cf file. This is strongly recommended if
you're not using NFS, as it is much faster than the NFS-safe locker.

- Please note that the use of the following command line parameters for
spamassassin and spamd have been deprecated and are now removed. If
you currently use these flags, please remove them:

in the 2.6x series: --add-from, --pipe, -F, -P, --stop-at-threshold, -S
in the 3.0.x series: --auto-whitelist, -a

- The following flags are de

Re:Release notes?

[AnotherScratchMonkey]

You can browse the version 3.0.0 Subversion repository. I'd suggest looking at the files UPGRADE and Changes.

For those who may have forgotten

[numbski]

I'm building the latest on all of my clients' mail exchangers and our primary boxen. ;)

Here's the command to install/upgrade 3.0 via CPAN:

# perl -MCPAN -e shell;
cpan > install Mail::SpamAssassin

(many lines, type in the administrator's e-mail address, say no to network tests)

exit

#

Very difficult stuff. :) Keep up the good work.

Oh! Some link whoring as well:

SpamAssassin Milter for Sendmail - Filters everyone without procmail

SpamAssassin Milter Quarantine - Quarantines spam messages and sends summaries in digest for 1 or more times daily rather than simply delivering to the end user.