Is it useful to have your own mail server as a non-business? Just a private person. Configure SMTP and IMAP for it, sync with outlook I think.

Yay or nay, waste of time? What are your thoughts?

  • gesis@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    My first IT job was as mail admin.

    I wouldn’t wish that shit on anybody.

    • Bubbagump210@alien.topBEnglish
      1·
      10 months ago

      I remember that job and also building the server myself from scratch. Qmail, Squirrelmail, Dovecot and all that. It lasted about a year until we bought something as it was hell. Now days with IP reputation and spam filters - even if the server ran, you’d never get anything delivered outbound.

      OP, the most I would do is an SMTP server that relays through Gmail for delivering alerts from monitoring systems. Anything else is pain.

      • nbfs-chili@alien.topBEnglish
        1·
        10 months ago

        I finally built my own mail server because if something broke my alerts would sometimes hit the maximum limit for a non-business gmail account and not get delivered.

        I learned a lot, but it is a pain in this day and age. I had to set up SPF and DMARC records to get it to deliver to gmail. I guess the next adventure is DKIM.

        • gihutgishuiruv@alien.topBEnglish
          1·
          10 months ago

          Assuming you’re using postfix as an MTA, it’s not too hard to get OpenDKIM up and running.

          My mail admin experience is pretty dated these days, but I followed this guide back in the day and had it working.

          • nbfs-chili@alien.topBEnglish
            1·
            10 months ago

            Unfortunately I’m using Citadel, which doesn’t have a lot of awesome documentation.

            Guess I get to learn some more.

      • dudeman2009@alien.topBEnglish
        1·
        10 months ago

        That’s all we do for clients that need on-prem equipment to scan that don’t support integration with Gmail/outlook online. Spin up an SMTP relay for things like scanners, alerts, Databases, etc. and just run that straight into Google/Microsoft Mail servers.

        Our latest migration was with MailEnable and going to Exchange online, which was a collosal mess.

      • PSYCHOPATHiO@alien.topBEnglish
        1·
        10 months ago

        i use proxmox mail gateway, i host both the gateway and mail server as vms on the same machine