[Pkg-exim4-users] Exim4 with local network as well as smarthost (longish post)

[Jeroen van Aart]

ael wrote:
> It is not hard, but it is a ridiculous waste of energy: this is a 
> *small* domestic network. I did say explicitly above that this sort of 
> solution was not appropriate here.

That sort of solution is appropriate almost anywhere. And at least in a 
small domestic network. You can easily find energy efficient systems, 
such as micro or pico ITX, or even laptops, which would serve well to be 
an always on mailserver. I have an old 800 mHz IBM thinkpad which has 
been on for almost 400 days and it barely makes a dent in the energy 
bill. My home mailserver is a G4 based system though, which similarly is 
very energy efficient.

I'd argue your solution will waste more resources than you are trying to 
save. If not in energy than at least in man hours.

Or are we talking about a 3rd world place with *very* limited resources?

> Surely Debian should cater for all sorts of users in as flexible a way 
> as possible?

It's all open source, you can make it do whatever you want, within the 
limitations of the hardware. Just remember this excerpt from the GNU 
General Public License: "...without even the implied warranty of
MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE..."

> But thanks for the reply: you seem to be confirming my feeling that this is an inherent limitation of the current version of exim.

Since you said that you are a total novice I do not believe you're 
actually correct.

You can still use the simpler and more manageable and robust solution of 
having 1 central gateway server even if it is not always on. Email 
intended for delivery will just queue up at the sender's MTA until you 
turn on your gateway machine and then deliveries will occur. Likewise 
mail will queue until other machines in your network are turned on.

Greetings,
Jeroen