I installed fedora core 3, which basically set everything up by default. However, I cannot get outlook express to connect via pop or imap to the fc3 server. I've done my best to find walkthroughs, howtos, and all that good stuff, but I can't figure out how to set this up correctly.

I have tried connecting via imap, pop, imap with ssl, and pop with ssl. Nothing connects.

On the other hand I do have squirrelmail installed, and doesn't that use dovecot? I don't seem to have problems with squirrelmail, although if I email myself on the server it does not come through. I'm not sure if squirrelmail checks to make sure imap works for the interface not to crash or not.

Does anyone have any advice?

-Justin

I would start from the basics -

On the server run:

netstat -tl

This will list all of the TCP ports that are being used by services. If SMTP and IMAP aren't there then the services haven't actually started. If they are, mail one account on the server from another.

I use the "mail" command for these kinds of tests, because it can read a mail spool directly.

As "jim":

mail bob@localhost

As "bob":

mail

You should then see the mail from jim. This proves that SMTP is delivering mails to the mailboxes in /var/spool/mail.

You can then move on to using SquirrelMail to check whether the mail is accessible via IMAP.

SquirrelMail does connect to the IMAP service on the system, but if you're not seeing mail then perhaps there is a problem with it.

I just tested it using this. smtp, pop3, pop3s, imap, and imaps are all running. I can also send emails through squirrelmail to user@localhost.

What should I check now?

-Justin

If you can send messages to a local account and pick them up via IMAP on the same box, then the next step is to verify that other machines can connect to the server on those ports.

The test for this is good ol' telnet.

on an XP box:

Start > Run > cmd

at the command prompt:

ping -a myserver@mydomain.com (to check connectivity).

then:

telnet myserver@mydomain.com 143

This connects to port 143 (IMAP) on your server and you should get a line of text back from the server. If you can ping but the telnet port tests don't work, check firewalls.