Starting: Sendmail

[RenegadeKing]

When linux boots up it comes to "Starting: Sendmail" and hangs there for about 5 minutes before it continues. It doesn't fail, and everything works fine afterwards, but it takes so long to start. It started doing this after I played around with the Network Configuration program. I messed everything up and couldn't get online, but I figured it out and fixed it. So,
1) What exactly is Sendmail?
2) Why might it be taking so long to start?
3) How can I fix it so it doesn't take so long?

Thanx in advance.

RenegadeKing

[Statica]

sendmail is an SMTP daemon/service that allows your machine to become its own outgoing mail server. This (or a similar daemon) is what is used by ISPs as well to send out mail. For example, if you were your own ISP or if you had a service where you are allowed to use your own domain name and your own mail service.

For a typical end-user who uses Linux to connect to an ISP, sendmail is redundant and is a security risk.

The reasons it takes long are quite a few, but the first things I would check are: is there a network available to your machine at boot time or do u have to dial in later? Is there an fqdn in /etc/hosts ?

In any even to disable it check your boot time services using linuxconf or SysV Init editor (these are the safest methods) and disable the start of sendmail.

HTH