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Mail-in-a-box: easy to set up modern SMTP/SMTPS server stack

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Re: Mail-in-a-box: easy to set up modern SMTP/SMTPS server stack

#131

Post by wvh »

Setting up your own mail server is a thorny problem. I've been setting up my (family's) own mail server, and despite having lots of experience, it has taken a month already. Even when encryption, authentication, spam and sieve filtering, IMAP and webmail work, there's still no SMTP backup or alternative server in case you accidentally end up being blacklisted somewhere. I'm not sure investing money and effort is really worth it for just a few people's mailboxes.

The whole process keeps getting more complicated as the internet grows more hostile and end-user requirements increase.

This project sounds interesting and much necessary, but the real problem to me is the economy of scale. If 10 Unix guys sit together and set up 2 servers for 20-30 personal mailboxes, the time and money might be worth it. Setting up all those services, filtering and redundancy by yourself for just yourself – and monitoring them continuously – is wasteful and painful, even if you like to tinker with Unix systems.

There used to be a few geek-oriented ISPs around that offered SMTP/DNS backup, spam filtering and similar services so you could off-load some effort, but I guess they've fallen prey to low-margin virtual server business.

Re: Mail-in-a-box: easy to set up modern SMTP/SMTPS server stack

#132

Post by nodata »

uuid_to_string wrote: post #124
nodata wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What? It was so much better when we used ip addresses in e-mail addresses?

Are we discussing control of email, or aesthetics of email? If you want to use names instead of numbers, then you can do that. You and your recipient must use the same DNS root.

You said using names instead of ip addresses was "part of the problem". ip addresses are normally non-portable, and difficult to remember and type.

Re: Mail-in-a-box: easy to set up modern SMTP/SMTPS server stack

#133

Post by dav- »

mstrem wrote: post #104

This is typical, I have just done the whole process myself a few weeks ago from scratch (fresh CentOS install) and now this comes up. However I do not regret it at all. I had Linux experience and it took me one day and a half work to get it all working very nicely. I am happy with my config: Postifx, Dovecot, RoundCube, SpamAssassin, ClamAV Server supports unlimited domains and user accounts - SSL is required for all…

You seem to have learned a lot in the process. Can you point to any good resources that helped you, specifically with security concerns and outgoing mail reliability? I've already got a mailserver running with a similar setup as you, but I haven't invested much effort into security or making sure mail providers accept my emails (Gmail sometimes marks them as spam and AOL rejects them all together).

Re: Mail-in-a-box: easy to set up modern SMTP/SMTPS server stack

#135

Post by selvan »

thisishugo wrote: post #16

It remains a constant frustration to me that Postfix, Exim, Cyrus, Dovecot and the like still feel as if they belong very much in the "here be dragons" territories of the Unix world. Configuring these systems is an exercise in constant frustration and bafflement. They're such a pain to use that since becoming the sysadmin in charge of our work email servers, I gave up running personal ones as well and just pay FastMa…

Do anyone have thoughts/feedback on Haraka - a mail server used by craigslist http://haraka.github.io/ ( Runs with Node.js + Javascript based plugin system )?

Re: Mail-in-a-box: easy to set up modern SMTP/SMTPS server stack

#136

Post by jradd »

dangayle wrote: post #90
Oculus wrote: post #87

After toying with the idea for a while, I've settled on using a service like Mailgun or Sendgrid is the best decision when it comes to setting up email. Otherwise, it's just too much work for little in gain (as far as I'm aware). I'm curious to hear what others think.

I love Mailgun and use it for every project that needs to send out email, but you have to admit it doesn't address the OP's purpose: To decentralize and own your own email

CTRL + F `mailgun` yayy...oh..nm

Re: Mail-in-a-box: easy to set up modern SMTP/SMTPS server stack

#137

Post by stevekemp »

Torgo wrote: post #68
clarry wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you tried OpenSMTPD[1]? I've been running it for a few years now, admittedly with a very basic setup. My config is about ten lines long, written in five minutes or so. I haven't really needed to touch it since. [1] https://www.opensmtpd.org/

I love OpenSMTPD. The only issue I had with it was, no filter API (just fixed, as of a month ago or so) and to get things like spam and antivirus filtering, or domainkeys, you have to proxy chain it. Also, the API changed very rapidly, and I had to run nightlies for a while to get around a few issues (I'm on stable now though with no problems.) These things add complexity to the configuration, but I would still rathe…

I use qpsmtpd as a SMTP proxy, which handles all my anti-spam checks, and does virtual domain lookups.

The setup is documented here, and pretty nice https://github.com/skx/ms-lite/

Re: Mail-in-a-box: easy to set up modern SMTP/SMTPS server stack

#138

Post by stevekemp »

selvan wrote: post #135
thisishugo wrote: post #16

It remains a constant frustration to me that Postfix, Exim, Cyrus, Dovecot and the like still feel as if they belong very much in the "here be dragons" territories of the Unix world. Configuring these systems is an exercise in constant frustration and bafflement. They're such a pain to use that since becoming the sysadmin in charge of our work email servers, I gave up running personal ones as well and just pay FastMa…

Do anyone have thoughts/feedback on Haraka - a mail server used by craigslist http://haraka.github.io/ ( Runs with Node.js + Javascript based plugin system )?

I've got an extensive qpsmtpd setup - the Perl-based precursor to haraka - and I've been meeting to port it over for over a year now.

My setup, with some documentation, is here https://github.com/skx/ms-lite/ and evolved from a commercial service http://book.mail-scanning.com/

I've used Haraka standalone for a couple of custom-jobs, but I've never used it at any significant volume. That said qpsmtpd was a pleasure to use, deploy, and develop against, so I'd expect to have a similar feeling with it.

Re: Mail-in-a-box: easy to set up modern SMTP/SMTPS server stack

#140

Post by stevekemp »

peterwaller wrote: post #32

It does greylisting by default. Greylisting is awesome at cutting down spam, but we recently noticed that it was preventing a major mail provider from getting through, among others, because it seems that this major provider doesn't use the same IP twice (at least sometimes). If ignoring email coming from a major provider isn't an option (it isn't.), then what are your options?

Yeah a lot of greylisting is naive and uses "sender", "recipient", and "IP" to discover repeats.

If you're going to implement greylisting yourself it makes more sent to hash the sender+recipient pair, allowing IP addresses of the senders to change - which is what will happen with many of the bigger mail-hosts, gmail, hotmail, etc.

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