Re: small mail server
On Wed, Dec 20, 2006 at 11:23:04AM +, Robin Becker wrote: I'm looking for some advice on using one of our existing freebsd 6.x servers as a mail server for a small number (20) of users. Our existing provider gives us 1) pop3/IMAP for reading mail 2) SMTP for sending, but we need to read mail before using smtp; I guess this implies we don't need to authenticate directly. 3) web based interface for adding users and redirections etc etc 4) spam filtering (presumably based on their large user mail volume). 5) white/grey listing I just want to let you know what i am doing about mail, maybe it's helpful: 1) I am using 'getmail' for my users which can't redirect their old addresses. Seems to operate rock solid so far. 2) Currently i run exim as MTA, but everyone is on its own here. Maybe sendmail has some extensions to do this POP before SMTP thing... (which i have turned off on my site, it's just ugly) I like exim for its clear yet powerful configuration. coupled with my postgres i have a central for user/pass and alias entries. IMAP server (courier-imap here) looks up in the postgres, too. 5) grey (or even the new hype: green) listing is a desperate attempt to block spam. I'll never use that. btw: My box provides an email platform for custom domains (free and easy) Armin -- PUBBOX Postmaster + spam-killer. Free email addresses at http://pubbox.net/ ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: small mail server
On Wed, 20 Dec 2006 06:36:28 -0900 Beech Rintoul [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Make sure you use the spamassassin binary (spamd) or it can get very slow. Running spamd avoids starting a new perl process on each email by running one as a daemon - it's still perl. I can't see it making much difference for 20 users. ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: small mail server
Robin Becker wrote: I'm looking for some advice on using one of our existing freebsd 6.x servers as a mail server for a small number (20) of users. Our existing provider gives us 1) pop3/IMAP for reading mail 2) SMTP for sending, but we need to read mail before using smtp; I guess this implies we don't need to authenticate directly. 3) web based interface for adding users and redirections etc etc 4) spam filtering (presumably based on their large user mail volume). 5) white/grey listing 1. If your users save a lot of mail on the server, check out Dovecot (or any of the IMAP servers that use Maildir). I started with IMAP-UW, but the response time on web frontends for users with large Inboxes was dismal. IMAP-UW is simple as an anvil as far as getting it up and running, Dovecot requires a tad more work. While setting up either one of these is trivial, converting existing formats to another (Mbox to Maildir) is not, choose wisely now, and save yourself a headache down the road. 2. Pick your poison. I've been using Sendmail for years and find it simple for small installations such as mine, and found Postfix confusing simply because of my familiarity with Sendmail, YMMV. 3. a. IMHO, simplest web front end for email - Squirrelmail b. My personal favorite web front end for email - Horde c. Web front end to add users, only Webmin comes to mind. (Webmin is for server administration only. There is a companion for users called Usermin that has an email frontend, but I didn't care for it all that much - YMMV) 45. spamassasin. White listing is a breeze. I never tried grey-listing, although it's my understanding that spamassasin can do this as well. A couple of other things that you may not have thought about regarding off-site access. Currently we need to allow our users to be able to send remotely. In order to do this, we needed to do two additional things, set up SASL for SMTP authentication was the first - so we didn't have an open relay. Second - we ran into an issue with the ISPs of certain users blocking the SMTP port. We installed stunnel for SMTPS, which isn't currently being blocked, and no issues so far. Another thought is to investigate any software you plan on installing with the email client your users have on their desktops. I currently have everyone using Thunderbird, which plays nice with everything I've installed on the server. Clients such as Outlook can have issues with certain software, and workarounds have to be implemented. Once you choose an MTA or IMAP server, google around and make sure you know what you're getting into in regards to your mail client. Best regards, Greg Groth ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: small mail server
Dave wrote: Hi, You want to set up a separate mail server from your isp? If that's the case I can do this if you want. I've got this working on a FreeBSD 6.1 box and i quite like it. This would actually give me the excuse i mean motivation to get webmail working on my own box as well. I would base this server on a postfix solution, and for the amound of users your not likely to need a database, that's overkill. HTH Dave. .. Thanks for the offer Dave, I don't think my boss would allow non-employees to access our servers. -- Robin Becker ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: small mail server
Jeff Palmer wrote: At 06:23 AM 12/20/2006, you wrote: Robin, I've had much success with the following guide. http://www.thekeyboardcowboys.org/help/fbsd_postfix/FreeBSD_Postfix.html It mentions everything you have above, with SMTP AUTH (you don't have to check mail before sending) Hope it helps, ... I've heard lots about Postfix, but have never used it. Since the box is currently only using sendmail for outgoing stuff I guess it shouln't be too much of a pain to try it out. I've actually been considering using a jail to do this so it should be fairly easy to do. -- Robin Becker ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: small mail server
-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE- Hash: SHA1 On 12/20/06 6:47 AM, Robin Becker wrote: Jeff Palmer wrote: At 06:23 AM 12/20/2006, you wrote: Robin, I've had much success with the following guide. http://www.thekeyboardcowboys.org/help/fbsd_postfix/FreeBSD_Postfix.html It mentions everything you have above, with SMTP AUTH (you don't have to check mail before sending) Hope it helps, ... I've heard lots about Postfix, but have never used it. Since the box is currently only using sendmail for outgoing stuff I guess it shouln't be too much of a pain to try it out. I've actually been considering using a jail to do this so it should be fairly easy to do. In my experience Postfix is simpler to administer than Sendmail, but it really depends on what you're familiar with. This might be overkill for your needs, but here's a useful guide to setting up Postfix and Squirrelmail for virtual domains: http://www.wistful.net/wiki/Ed's_FreeBSD_Virtual_Mail_How-To There are similar howtos for exim and qmail but I haven't tried these: http://www.tty1.net/virtual_domains_en.html http://freebsd.qmailrocks.org/ dn -BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE- Version: GnuPG v1.4.1 (Darwin) iD8DBQFFiVZ1yPxGVjntI4IRAvpAAJ9tPgFYqfvreipTy4kYeqrOmvTuJwCeI7ca x8x53/8kZ2NwFnXwJbsj78s= =1j9T -END PGP SIGNATURE- ___ freebsd-questions@freebsd.org mailing list http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions To unsubscribe, send any mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: small mail server
On Wednesday 20 December 2006 02:23, Robin Becker wrote: I'm looking for some advice on using one of our existing freebsd 6.x servers as a mail server for a small number (20) of users. Our existing provider gives us 1) pop3/IMAP for reading mail 2) SMTP for sending, but we need to read mail before using smtp; I guess this implies we don't need to authenticate directly. 3) web based interface for adding users and redirections etc etc 4) spam filtering (presumably based on their large user mail volume). 5) white/grey listing I would suggest postfix, spamassassin/procmail set server wide and the pop/imap server of your choice. Both postfix and spamassassin have detailed how-to's on their sites. IMHO postfix is much easier to configure than sendmail, but then I haven't used sendmail in years. Make sure you use the spamassassin binary (spamd) or it can get very slow. Spamassassin has whitelist/greylist, blacklist and RBH available. Beech -- --- Beech Rintoul - Sys. Administrator - [EMAIL PROTECTED] /\ ASCII Ribbon Campaign | Alaska Paradise Travel \ / - NO HTML/RTF in e-mail | 201 East 9Th Avenue Ste.310 X - NO Word docs in e-mail | Anchorage, AK 99501 / \ - Please visit Alaska Paradise - http://www.alaskaparadise.com --- pgp7qijIKtn9n.pgp Description: PGP signature
