[Gllug] E-Mail

[Bruce Richardson]

On Fri, Jan 09, 2004 at 02:25:47PM +0000, Peter wrote:
> 	Why is EMail so difficult?

Most E-mail protocols (smtp, pop, even imap) are actually very simple.
Many of the *nix implementations based on these protocols are also
simple, as are tools like mailx.  If you try tackling these tools
without a good understanding of both the fundamentals of the underlying
protocols and the fundamentals of Unix then you can face a real
struggle.  It's very common to see people posting questions about
problems with (for example) UW-Imap who obviously are not able to
distinguish between the requirements of the IMAP protocol and the
behaviour of the particular implementation.  They often seem to believe
in some mythical, monolithic creature called "E-mail" which handles all
tasks and makes everything instantly available.

> 
> 	I'm trying to set up a fully fedged multi-user E-Mail system.
> None of the answers are easy.

They are if you realise that there are several small questions rather
than one big one.  If you can visualise the separation between mail
delivery and mail storage and recognise that these tasks are independent
work with open protocols, so that the various tools available for each
task are interchangeable, setting up a mail system becomes a series of
small, easily achievable and testable tasks.

> 
> 	I was think of using exim/cyrus as shared folders would be nice
> one day.

Exim has nothing to do with shared folders, that's a mail
storage/retrieval issue handled (in this example) by the Cyrus
mailstore.  If shared folders would be nice "one day" then don't try
Cyrus yet.  Start with a simpler IMAP implementation like UW or Courier.
You can always move all the mail from that mailstore to a new one if you
need to move on to Cyrus - there are plenty of good tools to do this and
it can all be automated.

> 	You would have thought somone would have written a nice simple
> E-Mail server by now but no.

There's that mythical beast again.  Actually, though, the Courier
project provides a complete set of tools (mailstore, pop and imap
daemons, webmail, mta) but it's important to realise that they are
individual tools that can be mixed in with others: no reason why you
can't use Courier-IMAP with Exim and SquirrelMail.

> 
> 	I want it fully fuctional within 10 minites. any ideas?

Try http://e-smith.org/

-- 
Bruce

If the universe were simple enough to be understood, we would be too
simple to understand it.
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