o1bigtenor via Dng said on Thu, 2 Dec 2021 17:05:59 -0600

>On Tue, Nov 30, 2021 at 3:26 AM Adrian Zaugg
><devuan.org@???> wrote:
>
>> In der Nachricht vom Monday, 29 November 2021 23:08:33 CET schrieb
>> Adrian Zaugg:
>> > Be prepared for a long, long journey.... setting up an email
>> > system with SMTP/ IMAP/Webmail using all the goodies SPF/SRS,
>> > BATV, DKIM, DNSSEC, TLS certs, DANE, virusscanning, anti-spam
>> > Measures (possibly greylisting, classification, RBLs, dnswl, ...),
>> > virtual domain handling, user auth
>> from
>> > a directory, automatical MUA configuration, backup of the
>> > mailstorage,
>> asf.
>> ...sieve and vacation might also be nice and a solution for an
>> addressbook,
>> both integrated into the webmail....
>>
>
>
>Hmmmmmmmmm - - - - interesting ideas.
>A couple votes for dovecot, lots of roll your own using selected from
>the plethora of
>options - - - but - - - - - .
>
>I had thought that when I asked about an email system that there might
>be words
>re: dovecot (which I did see - - thanks) but what about iRedMail,
>Citadel, Cyrus
>- - - - - or are those considered groupware only?
>
>I think I'm getting more confused rather than less!!!!!!!!!!

It's not a simple subject, especially if you want a true smtp server in
the mix.

I don't run an smtp server, because most email clients have a built-in
smtp on-ramp, and even if they don't, you could use a dedicated
smtp on-ramp like nullmailer. If this paragraph is confusing, ignore
it; it's not really important.

The philosophy behind my suggestion is "do one thing and do it well".
In most setups, the email client does tons of things: Grabs your
email from your ISPs IMAP or POP3 server, lets you read mail, lets you
write mail, stores your mail, folderizes your mail, lets you move mail
between folders and organize your email, and filter your email. This is
wonderful until it isn't. I found that out the hard way, in 2012, when
Kmail became the crapitudinous Kmail2, and I became a refugee. Because
Kmail had encompassed so much of my email activity in one place, it was
almost irreplaceable. I think people on this list could relate, using a
metaphor about a certain "we do it all for you" PID1.

So in my setup, fetchmail grabs the email from my ISP, and hands it off
to procmail, who filters the email and places each email in the proper
folder of my Daily Driver Desktop's (DDD's) Dovecot IMAP server's
maildir. My procmail IMAP serves out emails to whatever email client
looks into it. I normally use Claws-mail, but can use Thunderbird or
pretty much any other completely IMAP aware email client.

Claws-Mail is pretty much just a window into my DDD's Dovecot IMAP
server, plus it can let me write emails, and via a built in
smtp-onramp, it can let me send them. It also provides a very nice
environment to add, move and delete emails and folders.

For various reasons I hope to move from Claws-mail to something else:
Perhaps Mutt, perhaps Alpine. Mutt would be the ultimate do one thing
and do it yourself because it doesn't have an smtp on-ramp but instead
relies on qmail, postfix, sendmail and the like. And Mutt doesn't have
its own editor, but instead puts you into your favorite editor. I don't
think I can use Mutt to rearrange emails and folders, so I'll need to
use IMAP commands for that; perhaps even write my own gui app to do
that.

Mutt is very hard to learn and very undiscoverable, but that's not why
I haven't made the switch yet. Mutt doesn't seem to be able to discover
all the folders in my DDD's IMAP server. Once I get past that, I'll
probably switch to Mutt.

So that's it. My setup is based on the "do one thing and do it well"
philosophy, and is more email client agnostic than most other setups,
so I'll never again get trapped by an email client going bad.

SteveT

Steve Litt
Spring 2021 featured book: Troubleshooting Techniques of the Successful
Technologist http://www.troubleshooters.com/techniques