---
name: "etrn"
section: "8"
platform: "linux"
package: "sendmail-base"
version: "8.18.1-6"
release: "Debian 13 (Trixie)"
platforms: ["linux"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/etrn"
---

# etrn(8)

System Administration Commands                           [etrn(8)](/etrn/8.md)

NAME\
      etrn - start mail queue run

SYNOPSIS\
      etrn \[-v\] server-host \[client-hosts\]

DESCRIPTION\
      SMTP's  ETRN  command  allows  an  SMTP client and server to\
      interact, giving the server an opportunity to start the pro­\
      cessing  of  its  queues for messages to go to a given host.\
      This is meant to be used in start-up conditions, as well  as\
      for mail nodes that have transient connections to their ser­\
      vice providers.

     The etrn utility initiates an SMTP  session  with  the  host\
      server-host  and sends one or more ETRN commands as follows:\
      If no client-hosts are specified, etrn looks up  every  host\
      name  for  which  sendmail(1M)  accepts  email and, for each\
      name, sends an ETRN command with that name as the  argument.\
      If  any  client-hosts are specified, etrn uses each of these\
      as arguments for successive ETRN commands.

OPTIONS\
      The following option is supported:

     \-v    The normal mode of operation for etrn is to do all  of\
 	   its  work  silently.   The -v option makes it verbose,\
 	   which causes etrn to display  its  conversations  with\
 	   the remote SMTP server.

ENVIRONMENT\
      No environment variables are used.

FILES\
      /etc/mail/sendmail.cf\
 	   sendmail configuration file

SEE ALSO\
      sendmail(1M), RFC 1985.

CAVEATS\
      Not all SMTP servers support ETRN.

CREDITS\
      Leveraged from David Muir Sharnoff's expn.pl script.  Chris­\
      tian von Roques added support for args and fixed a couple of\
      bugs.

AVAILABILITY\
      The  latest  version  of  etrn  is  available in the contrib\
      directory of the sendmail distribution through anonymous ftp\
      at ftp://ftp.sendmail.org/ucb/src/sendmail/.

AUTHOR\
      John T. Beck    \<john@beck.org\>