# I need an email server.

## bmph8ter

Hey fellow Gentoo users!  Hope someone out there can help me with this.  I am needing to setup some services on a "toy" Gentoo box at my office.  I got Apache & FTP running with no problems , just need to create the site now.   :Very Happy:  What is really giving me problems is email.  I've never setup and email server on any *nix before and it's kicking my butt.  I got Postfix (SMTP) running and can send email to the outside world.  Courier IMAP (POP3) however is giving me fits!  I got it installed and correctly configured (I think) & the port (110) shows to be listening with a  "netstat -a".  I can also telnet into port 110.  I can't retrieve email from the server though.

I have some theories about it.

1.  The server is on an internal 192.168.0.x network and our ISP has no DNS record for it.

So, I give it one of our external IPs and have them add a DNS entry right?

2.  The servers name is just "allevil" (root @ allevil ha!).

Change it to reflect or domain to?  The domain we registered is 

n-teksolutions.com so maybe the servers name should be allevil.n-teksolutions.com?

3.  I'm just a n00b (been using Linux on the desktop for 8-9 months) and never will get it to work.

So I just give up?

A couple more things and I will go away.  I've setup email servers on Windows machines before (using Mercury), but it formats the email addresses wierd.  It adds the server name to the addressExample:If the server name is allevil, and the domain is n-teksolutions.com, the email addresses would be user@allevil.n-teksolutions.com.  This is bad.  I can name the server as I wish (humor me), but I highly doubt my boss would like allevil in his email address.  Is there a way around that?

Is it safe for me to give this machine an external IP address?  The only reason I installed FTP is so I can modify the site remotely (didn't know how to do the Front Page extensions).  The only user that has FTP access is mine, and it is locked into my home directory.  Thank you everyone.

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## vicay

Hello,

1.) Where are the users of the Mail/POP Server located?

     Can they reach the Mailserver via the local network, or

     do they access the POP-Service via official internet addresses?

     - If they sit locally (within the 192.168.0.x) network, then 

       the server does not have to have an official IP.

      - If the pop-users connect from the outside, your server should

        have an official IP.  :Smile: 

       - If your Mailserver is only sending mail for you, it is not 

         necessary to add it to the DNS. But if this server also recieves

         mail for the n-teksolutions.com domain, it has to be added

         in the DNS Server as official MX.

      - You should test, if connecting and login to the POP Server works

        at all by telnetting port 110 locally and loggin in a user manually

      - If you give your machine an official IP you should at least switch

        off all unused network services, looking through your apache/ftp

        configurations for obvious problems and taking care, that your

        Postfix Mailserver doesn't act as an open relay. Then your server

       might survive it for a while  :Smile: 

best regards

vicay

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## bmph8ter

For the most part, users will be on the internal network for all intents and purposes.  I would however like to give them the ability to check their mail remotely.  AFAIK, the only network service running are Apache, FTP, and (sort of) email.  I will double and triple check all of this before going live.  I have plenty of time to get everything right & test (a week or two), so hopefully I can get everything going on schedule.

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## vicay

 *bmph8ter wrote:*   

> For the most part, users will be on the internal network for all intents and purposes.  I would however like to give them the ability to check their mail remotely.  AFAIK, the only network service running are Apache, FTP, and (sort of) email.  I will double and triple check all of this before going live.  I have plenty of time to get everything right & test (a week or two), so hopefully I can get everything going on schedule.

 

Hello,

ok, so this server has to be reachable for both parties. So you might place it

with an official IP into your DMZ. 

What errrors do you get when trying to authenticate a user via telnetting

port 110,

Can you connect from your 192.168.0.x network?

vicay

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## bmph8ter

It works OK from the internal network.  Well, telnet does.  I called our ISP a little bit ago to get the DNS entries added.  Hopefully they should take effect by tomorrow.

Thanks for your help.    :Smile: 

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