Knowledge base
What kind of complaint arrived
The name of the format of the incoming report.
In complaint records it is part of the default set, in asynchronous bounce records it has to be named in record-fields. The field set is defined in the accounting block, and fields are worth adding deliberately: there are as many delivery records as delivered recipients, and every extra column is multiplied by that volume.
There are several complaint formats, and they are parsed differently: this field shows which one was parsed.
The main trap is assuming the field is the same for all record types. For f it is in the default set, for rb it is not: the star in record-fields rb will not give it, and in a shared file those lines keep the column empty.
What the Hub does. The field arrives via the webhook in complaint records, but the event normalizer does not parse it: from a complaint the Hub takes the record type, recipient, sender, address and time. Complaint records are not written to the accounting file on the node.
Recommended values
Where the field exists and whether the star includes it:
| Record type | In the star |
|---|---|
| rb, rs — external report | no |
| f — complaint | yes |
In a shared file an empty value comes in two kinds: the line has no data — or the field is not selected for its record type.
The record types with this field and the default set markers come from the manual (§ 12.2.6, § 12.2.7); a list without the star replaces the set — § 3.3.11.12. The table is ours.
Example configuration
<acct-file /var/log/pmta/acct.csv> record-fields rb *, format</acct-file>
For f the field comes with the star; for rb it is added explicitly.
yellow — — directive names, blue — blocks. They are highlighted the same way in the text of the card.
Compatibility
PowerMTA 6.0
described in the manual of this version · platform: any
The vendor does not state the first version for every directive — there is no note here. The name also appears in the 5.0 edition of the manual.
How to check on the node
Check whether the column is in the latest accounting file:
head -1 "$(ls -t /var/log/pmta/acct-*.csv | head -1)" | tr -d '\r' | tr ',' '\n' | grep -n '^format$'
The line number in the output is the column number in the file; empty means the field is not selected for any record type in this file.
In the Hub
- Cost of a mistake
- safe: a wrong value breaks nothing