[CoLoCo] Mail Server (shouldn't be this hard)

[Dave Vanderploeg]

Overall knowledge is the problem, for sure, but just as a vent I'm
*amazed*at how difficult this is. Ease of use is NOT a selling point.
I could get a
fax server running on Windows in less than 20 minutes. It would cost more,
but doing this through linux feels archaic. This seems like the exact reason
that company's claim that Windows is more cost effective. Unless you're
already familiar with this software, its difficult to use and has mediocre
documentation. The only reason I'm still chasing it is a personal dedication
to eliminating Microsoft from my computers as often as possible.

Frankly, I think Hylafax should have an option to log on to a server and
send out PDF's, but again, a feature common on Windows software is left out
of Linux.

Now that I've said that, I want to clarify: I *do not* need to receive mail,
just push messages to a server. I think Postfix calls this a Null setup.

Dave.

On Nov 9, 2007 9:17 AM, Kevin Fries <kfries at cctus.com> wrote:

>
> On Fri, 2007-11-09 at 10:51 -0500, Michael "TheZorch" Haney wrote:
> > I haven't figured out how to do this yet either.  A friend of mine used
> > to work maintaining a Red Hat system for a company on a hosted server.
> > He used Qmail on that server.  Its a secure email server which requires
> > your client to use SSL security.  If Qmail is still around and in a
> > package compatible with Ubuntu I'd recommend using that.
>
> It sounds as if the mail server is not the issue here, but general
> overall knowledge is.
>
> Any mail server should work just fine.  If any of them are different and
> should probably be avoided by noobs its QMail... The mail server is
> great, but built and maintained by a guy whose ego makes even uncle Bill
> look humble.  So, he moves things into non-standard (sometimes better,
> mostly just wrong) locations, and has no problem telling you that his
> was is the only truly intelligent way of doing things.  Like I said, if
> you are not extremely good dealing with mail servers, I would avoid
> QMail.
>
> In the past I have used Postfix, and continue to do so to this day.  It
> just works, works like you expect, and is as secure and stable as
> anything you can find.  Plus... its in the Ubuntu repositories.
>
> The OPs real problem is that mail servers really need to be on fixed IP
> addresses.  When they are not, then configuration gets a little weird.
> If you have a fixed IP, you can have your upstream (i.e. ISP) route
> easily to your server.  Without a fixed IP, it is generally easier to
> pull email, rather than push it.  Its a technique I have not seen done
> in quite a while, so excuse me if my memory is a little fuzzy.
>
> To pull mail instead of pushing it, you need to use a program like
> fetchmail to "fetch" all email from your ISP.  You probably want no mail
> boxes up there, but instead just a single catchall account (no joe
> account, not mark account, and no mary account, but you have an all
> account configured as "catch all"... mail sent to joe at me.com,
> mark at me.com, or mary at me.com end up in the all at me.com account).  You then
> use fetchmail to retrieve the email and pass it to your local Postfix
> server for internal processing and final delivery.  A quick search on
> Google and I found someone doing this for a home Linux setup:
>
> http://www.jennings.homelinux.net/mailserver_config.html
>
> The other option is to use a dynamic DNS setup.  In this case, you run a
> daemon on your local Linux mail server to always publish your current IP
> address to a special server (no-ip, dyndns, etc).  Then setup your MX
> record by name that is resolved by that DNS server.  This should route
> to your mail server just like if it had a static IP.  There are numerous
> problems with that setup, and rarely works as well as it seems like it
> should.  But depending on your needs, could be a very viable solution.
>
> Hope this helps
>
> --
> Kevin Fries
> Senior Linux Engineer
> Computer and Communications Technology, Inc
> A Division of Japan Communications Inc.
>
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