[Freedombox-discuss] Email on the FreedomBox Discussion

[Matthew Platte]

On 08/26/2011 10:15 PM, John Walsh wrote:

> Now, if anybody else has email specific issues or even better FBX email
> recipes, please contribute. I will even write up the recipes on the FBX wiki
> for you if you post your recipe to this thread ;)

tl;dr summary:  I am not a linux geek but I want these services to Just 
Work.  I have proven in the past that even I can muddle through and get 
a mail server to run reasonably well for years -- but I don't want to 
have to think about all those gory details any more.

--

I think I'm in the early adopter FBX demographic but not the FBX 
developer group: I want these services running on my own hardware in my 
own house but I'm not a *NIX system administrator. Not even a hobbyist, 
really; I just want my computers to be functional so I can get on with 
my regular work (web development).

I've been running my own servers at home since 2001-02 and have been 
hosting email for myself all along.  It hasn't been so bad these past 
few years but early on it was a struggle.

Last time I upgraded hardware circa 2007 I followed a recipe similar to 
or exactly like this (note the date):

   http://www.adomas.org/2006/08/postfix-dovecot/

... for postfix and dovecot.  I used squirrelmail then switched to 
roundcube.  For everyday use, though, I use Thunderbird.

I must say that converting from mbox to maildir is a real pain for the 
casual administrator.  Getting the first virtual mailbox up is also a 
bit odd what with everything needing to be done as root and not easily 
being able to see whats' going on inside the virtual directories.  SPAM 
isn't the problem that it used to be and I suspect that most of it is 
not getting all the way to my server.  I have a static IP address from 
my ISP and they are the backup MX.

I prefer opinionated.  I don't want to decide between some University 
IMAP and Dovecot.  During setup I'll happily type in names, IP addresses 
and server details but the fewer decisions I have to make, the better.

Thank you all for doing what you're doing.

--
m