Normally, makemap expects the key and data portions of its input file to be separated from each other by linear whitespace (space and tab characters). The following is an example of such an input file:

key                 data 
 
          
lady     relaysite!lady
       
  whitespace

Beginning with V8.12 sendmail, an alternative to whitespace can be specified on the command line. Consider, for example, an input file (named infile) that is delimited with commas:

key,data

To read such an input file with makemap you would run something like the following:

% makemap -t, hash  outfile < infile   

The delimiting character that follows the -t must be just a single character. If a multicharacter delimiting character is specified, all but the first character will be silently ignored. If the delimiting character has special meaning to the shell (as does a semicolon), be sure to quote or escape it:

-t\;   escaped with a backslash
-t ';' quoted