Looking For a Mail Server

carlosinfl · 01-06-2006, 01:55 PM

I was wondering if there are any recommended mail servers for me. I am a very basic Linux user so I don't need a large scale ENT. edition. It's just for maybe 10 people.

My 2005 goal was to get a working FTP server in Linux which I think is great. Now my 2006 goal is a fully functioning mail sever on Linux. The machine I would like to install this on is just a very basic home made server.

1.6GHz AMD CPU
2GB DDR RAM
200GB hdd
Debian "Etch"

I have only installed and used Microsoft Exchange so this will be new for me. I don't need anything crazy. Just something very simple. Easy install and maybe a GUI webmail interface.

If you guys can point me in the right direction, I would be greatly appreciated.

acid_kewpie · 01-06-2006, 02:32 PM

try exim, postfix or qmail. I *think* most debian hippies like exim, but don't quote me on that... also for webmail, squirrelmail is a standard, but i much prefer the more powerful horde/imp framework.

carlosinfl · 01-06-2006, 03:41 PM

So I use exim as a mail server and squirrelmail as my web mail client or do I just install Squirrelmail?

acid_kewpie · 01-06-2006, 04:46 PM

well there's no such thing as a "mail server" other than what you'd call the box that's running the various seperate components. exim will just provide SMTP, i.e allow you to centrally recieve mail. it's then up to webmail to allow a user to access it, or a pop2/imap server to allow clients to pull mail out in other ways.

carlosinfl · 01-08-2006, 05:39 PM

So which SMTP option do you think is the easiest to install and config?

acid_kewpie · 01-09-2006, 01:30 AM

any of ther three above would suit you fine i'm sure.personally i use postfix at the moment, which is fairly nice to configure.

carlosinfl · 01-09-2006, 11:11 AM

OK - I just used APT-GET to install postfix. As you can see below...

If I understand you correctly, "Postfix" only gives me the ability to send mail via SMTP protocol. Now what would I need for receiving email via POP3 or IMAP?

Code:

stricom:~# apt-cache search postfix
mailgraph - Mail statistics RRDtool frontend for Postfix
masqmail - A mailer for hosts without permanent internet connection
mb2md - Converting Mbox mailboxes to Maildir format
pflogsumm - Postfix log entry summarizer
postfix - A high-performance mail transport agent
postfix-dev - Postfix loadable modules development environment
postfix-doc - Postfix documentation
postfix-gld - greylisting daemon for postfix, written in C, uses MySQL
postfix-ldap - LDAP map support for Postfix
postfix-mysql - MYSQL map support for Postfix
postfix-pcre - PCRE map support for Postfix
postfix-pgsql - PGSQL map support for Postfix
postfix-policyd - anti-spam plugin for Postfix
postgrey - greylisting implementation for Postfix
qpsmtpd - Flexible SMTP daemon for network-level spam detection
scalemail - Scalable virtual mail domain system built on Postfix and LDAP
webmin-postfix - postfix control module for webmin

carlosinfl · 01-09-2006, 11:15 AM

I have never set this up. Is there a basic guide I can follow?

http://img327.imageshack.us/img327/2381/postfix8dl.jpg

acid_kewpie · 01-09-2006, 11:59 AM

postfix has a config tool?? news to me... i just edit the main.conf file personally, it's all very well documented and such. i'm sure the postfix homepage has plenty of information for new users.

as for imap / pop3... try dovecot, courier-imap or cyrus-imap among others.

bkesting · 01-09-2006, 01:58 PM

I don't know what you are all looking for in a mail solution, but give Hula a try. It is an open-source project derived from Novell's Netmail project. It has a pretty solid mail client and calendaring options.

carlosinfl · 01-10-2006, 06:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by acid_kewpie

as for imap / pop3... try dovecot, courier-imap or cyrus-imap among others.

Ok - I found and am messing around with the main.cf file for post fix. Now my only question is after installing postfix, all I am missing is something to send the messages/mail to the client, right?

acid_kewpie · 01-11-2006, 01:26 AM

you don't send mail TO a client, the client pulls it FROM the server, via pop3 or imap

carlosinfl · 01-11-2006, 06:03 AM

OK - that make sense. I just wanted to know now what else I was missing beyond "PostFix". Just to be sure I have everything I need to configure mail.

carlosinfl · 01-21-2006, 10:26 AM

I think my new system has exim4 installed as a base part of the distro, how can I check?

acid_kewpie · 01-21-2006, 10:29 AM

depends what distro it is huh? at worst try a "locate exim" and see what turns up