A professional mail server with qmail and vpopmail
Qmail is a good solution for an email server, but I think the current official qmail-src package is outdated and not good for using on a modern mail server. That is why I created an unofficial qmail-src package with some suitable patches:
SMTP-AUTH for Debian Sarge 3.1 (Fixed)
qmail-dnsbl patch (added logging)
qmail-queue-custom-error.patch (for simscan)
qmail-smtp-log-patch
chkuser 2.0
qmail-dnsbl patch lets the client authenticate (using any method implemented), and then decides to perform the DNSBL check looking at the authentication status before the DATA SMTP command is performed.
If the check fails, the server closes the SMTP conversation before receiving the mail, avoiding any resource wasting.
chkuser 2.0 The original qmail-smtpd accepts by default all messages, checking later for the existence of the recipients. So, if the message is delivered to a non-existing recipient, a lot of additional system work and network traffic is generated, with several expensive bouncing if the sender is a fake.
chkuser has been developed with the goal to improve the acceptance SMTP phase of qmail-smtpd.
qmail-smtpd patched with chkuser may check the existence of e-mail recipients immediately in the SMTP acceptance phase of a message and rejects instantly all the messages sent to unexisting users, thus avoiding additional traffic, workload and messages bounced more times.
These goals are achieved by enquiring the existing vpopmail archives (each format is supported: cdb, MySQL, LDAP, etc.) by using standard vpopmail calls, or using customized chkuser routines.
chkuser 2.0 has detailed logging of accepted and refused recipients and senders, thus allowing a deeper analysis of “who’s sending to whom”. This can facilitate any further enhancements of anti-SPAM features.
N.B. Current qmail version works only with my vpopmail-mysql package!
You can get more details here: http://debian.iuculano.it
So, let’s go, in less than ten minutes we can have a full performant mail server!
Just open your terminal and add my deb repository in your sources.list:
debian:~# vi /etc/apt/sources.list
Add these lines:
deb http://debian.iuculano.it/apt sarge main contrib non-free deb-src http://debian.iuculano.it/apt sarge main contrib non-free
and:
debian:~# apt-get update
My vpopmail package uses mysql backend, so we need mysql-server:
apt-get install mysql-server
It is strongly recommended to set a password for the mysql root user
(which is NOT the same as the “normal” root user) with the command:
mysqladmin -u root password 'enter-your-good-new-password-here'
debian:~# mysqladmin -u root -p create vpopmail debian:~# mysql -u root -p Enter password: Welcome to the MySQL monitor. Commands end with ; or \g. Your MySQL connection id is 10 to server version: 4.0.24_Debian-10sarge2-log Type 'help;' or '\h' for help. Type '\c' to clear the buffer. mysql> GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON `vpopmail` . * TO 'vpopmail'@'localhost' \ IDENTIFIED BY 'some_pass' WITH GRANT OPTION ; Query OK, 0 rows affected (0.01 sec) mysql> quit Bye debian:~#
Good, now we can install qmail, vpopmail, spamassasin
debian:~# apt-get install qmail-src spamassassin vpopmail-mysql spamc razor pyzor ucspi-tcp-src libmailtools-perl libmail-spf-query-perl libsys-hostname-long-perl
Now we build ucspi-tcp
debian:~# build-ucspi-tcp
And finally, we build qmail!
debian:~# build-qmail
Don’t worry if you get an error message when installing the .deb package; we need to remove exim4!
debian:~# dpkg --force-depends --purge exim4 exim4-base exim4-config exim4-daemon-light
Now:
debian:~# dpkg -i /tmp/qmail/qmai*.deb
Very well, now if you want SMTP AUTH and chkuser, you should edit /etc/init.d/qmail
If you want chkuser you should change CHKUSER_START to DOMAIN or ALWAYS
If you want chkuser you should replace:
-u `id -u qmaild` -g `id -g nobody` -x /etc/tcp.smtp.cdb 0 smtp \
with:
-u vpopmail -g vckpw -x /etc/tcp.smtp.cdb 0 smtp \
Setting your mail name:
vi /etc/qmail/me
And add your mail name, for example mail.domain.org
Setting mysql username and password for vpopmail
debian:~# vi /etc/vpopmail/vpopmail.mysql
and restart qmail and popmail POP3
debian:~# /etc/init.d/qmail restart && /etc/init.d/vpopmail-mysql restart Stopping mail-transfer agent: qmail. Starting mail-transfer agent: qmail. Restarting vpopmail pop3 server: vpopmail. debian:~#
Very well, we ‘re almost done!!
Some check-ups:
debian:~# apt-get install recode [...] debian:~# vadddomain test.bogus Please enter password for postmaster: enter password again: debian:~# ls -la /var/lib/vpopmail/domains/ totale 3 drwx------ 3 vpopmail vchkpw 1024 2006-07-07 16:34 . drwxr-xr-x 6 root root 1024 2006-07-07 16:09 .. drwx------ 3 vpopmail vchkpw 1024 2006-07-07 16:34 test.bogus debian:~# echo -en "postmaster@test.bogus" | recode data..base64 cG9zdG1hc3RlckB0ZXN0LmJvZ3Vz debian:~# echo -en "test" | recode data..base64 dGVzdA== debian:~# telnet localhost 25 Trying 127.0.0.1... Connected to localhost.localdomain. Escape character is '^]'. 220 mail.domain.com ESMTP quit 221 mail.domain.com Connection closed by foreign host. debian:~# less /var/log/syslog debian:~# telnet localhost 25 Trying 127.0.0.1... Connected to localhost.localdomain. Escape character is '^]'. 220 mail.domain.com ESMTP HELO TEST 250 mail.domain.com EHLO 250-mail.domain.com 250-AUTH LOGIN CRAM-MD5 PLAIN 250-AUTH=LOGIN CRAM-MD5 PLAIN 250-PIPELINING 250 8BITMIME AUTH LOGIN 334 VXNlcm5hbWU6 cG9zdG1hc3RlckB0ZXN0LmJvZ3Vz 334 UGFzc3dvcmQ6 dGVzdA== 235 ok, postmaster@test.bogus, go ahead (#2.0.0) mail from: test@nonexact.from 511 sorry, can't find a valid MX for sender domain (#5.1.1 - chkuser) mail from: test@test.com 250 ok RCPT TO: notexist@test.bogus 511 sorry, no mailbox here by that name (#5.1.1 - chkuser) RCPT TO: postmaster@test.bogus 250 ok quit 221 mail.domain.com Connection closed by foreign host. debian:~#
Good! Everything seems to work finely!
Now, the last thing you have to do is:
debian:~# apt-get install qmailadmin autorespond ezmlm-src clamav clamav-daemon clamav-freshclam
Install simscan (http://www.inter7.com/simscan/simscan-1.2.tar.gz) and edit init.d/qmail !
Simscan ./configure example:
./configure --enable-user=clamav --enable-clamav=y --enable-custom-smtp-reject=y --enable-attach=y --enable-spam=y --enable-spam-hits=14 --enable-spamc-user=y --enable-received=y --enable-clamavdb-path=/var/lib/clamav --enable-spam-auth-user=n --enable-quarantinedir=/var/qmail/quarantine --enable-dropmsg=y