Re: which MTA to choose for a simple client?
On Wed, 09 Oct 2013 03:13:27 +0200
berenger.morel@neutralite.org wrote:
...
> For the fetcher, I am surprised that debian does not seems to recommend
> or suggest using one, so I will not spend time on that -for now at
> least- and will do as the article says, unless I discover something
> interesting in the process.
I recommend getmail.
> But for the tool to send mails, things are different: I can count 16
> alternatives. Some are obviously wrong for my use, like lsb-invalid-mta,
> postfix or exim ( those last ones are probably too big for my simple
> usage, they seems designed for big boxes where mailing is an important
> task ), but even after removing some obvious ones, I still have a lot of
> choice.
>
> So, here is my question:
> What would you use as a MTA on a Debian system made for an end-user?
I've used Exim, basically because it's (was?) the Debian default.
Configuration can be confusing, but once you have it going, it works
well.
Caveats:
* It's designed for server use, so you'll really need to get used to
certain things, such as inspecting the logs when things go wrong,
instead of communicating with it via some sort of dialog, as with much
desktop software.
* Configuration can be *really* confusing. Additionally, Debian has a
very idiosyncratic configuration system, which upstream can't stand,
and absolutely won't support.
> Of course, I could take one of them at random and try to go with it,
> but I would like to take the occasion to learn basics about that,
> without installing a tool from which I will never use or understand 10%
> of the features...
> So, I would like something which:
> _ supports IMAP, POP3 and SMTP ( this does not sound excessive I think,
You need to get acquire a better understanding of mail handling in *nix
- pulling mail and sending mail are generally handled by different
tools. We've discussed fetchers (Mail Retrieval Agents) earlier -
they'll handle IMAP and POP3. Outgoing mail will be handled by an MTA,
which will speak SMTP.
> but if there are other important protocols, I do not even know their
> existences or uses )
Extensions to POP and SMTP, such as SSL support. I think support for
them is pretty standard.
> _ is not a daemon running constantly: why should I have a daemon
> running to send mail when I am not connected to Internet or not taking
> care of my mails? Something which is started by the client ( MUA it
> seem? ) is good enough for me and does not consume time when starting or
> shutting down my computers.
> _ is lightweight, because I always aim to have a system which let all
Assuming you're using a smarthost (relay host), you
can use a relay server such as ssmpt, msmtp or nullmailer which I
believe all meet these two conditions.
Celejar
Reply to: