----- Original Message -----
From: Alan Lee
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Friday, December 29, 2000 10:44 AM
Subject: [SLUG] Email Server
> Im looking for an email server, which is easy to install, easy to
> config, and keeps working. Its required to be able to support
> multipical domains, and would be nice to have a web interface to it..
>
> .. What do other people use?
OK, First of all - this reflects my *personal* views, because I know
people are going to jump and and down, and complain about what I'm going
to say.
Sendmail should be your first choice for an MTA. Sendmail is moderately
efficent [especially when compared to qmail], keeps on working, is easy
to install, supports Virutal Domains, etc - and is easy enough to configure
once you know how (Yes, there is a "secret" that would be better known if
people bothered to read manuals).
1) Installation.
Use whatever package you have for sendmail with your system. If you
can't use that, download a recent release, and compile it following the
build instructions - they've worked on everything I've thrown it at in
the past. If you are building, be sure to build (or install) Berkeley DB
*first*, since hash map support is a Good Thing(tm).
2) Configuration.
look at sendmail.cf, release that its the most disgusting format ever,
then ignore it. Use the m4 scripts instead. (The m4 scripts are the
secret to an easy configuration process). The m4 scripts are also
very well documented - and you should definately read their manual.
Fortunately, if you get things right, you only ever need to do the
sendmail.mc and cf files once ever - and configure everything else
elsewhere.
You probably want to enable the cw file (local hostnames), virtusertable,
mailertable, and accessdb (relay/block control) features at least.
3) Virtual hosting.
Sendmail has two features for this.
Virtual Domain handling for inbound messages is handled via the
virtusertable.
Virtual Domain handling for outbound messages is handled via the
mailertable.
Read the quick overview at sendmail.org. The sendmail system is
quite simple and powerful. The main thing to remember is to run
makemap to rebuild the tables after editing them.
4) Web Admin Interface
Are you nuts? What would you want such a beast for?
It should be trivial to write a CGI/PHP/Mason system to edit
virtuserhosts, mailertable, access table, etc though.
Sendmail, once its running, is incrediably easy to look after though.
C.
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