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Introduction to installation

The most commonly used e-mail server in Linux is Sendmail; however, as it is very hard to configure, we will use Qmail, an alternative e-mail server, instead.

Qmail is made up of a group of programs that work with different UID/GIDs, in order to minimise intrusions.

Packages needed for installation

In order to install Qmail, the following packages are required:

• functions-2-1.i386.rpm
• daemontools-0.53-16-i386.rpm
• ucspi-tcp-0.84-1.i386.rpm
• qmail-1.03-14ucspi.i386.rpm
• checkpassword-0.81-2.i386.rpm

They may be downloaded from the website RPMFind.net.

Installing Qmail

To install Qmail, you must first install all these RPM packages:

rpm -ivh functions-2-1.i386.rpm
rpm -ivh daemontools-0.53-16-i386.rpm 
rpm -ivh ucspi-tcp-0.84-1.i386.rpm 
rpm -ivh qmail-1.03-14ucspi.i386.rpm 
rpm -ivh checkpassword-0.81-2.i386.rpm

• /var/qmail: main directory
• \_ alias/: for storing "special" accounts (like root)
• \_ bin/: Qmail distribution binaires
• \_ control/: configuration files
• \_ defaultdelivery/: configuration files for mailbox formatting
• \_ man/: pages in the manual
• \_ doc/: documentation
• \_ queue/: the queue file
• \_ users/: address map (super-file of aliases)

export MANPATH=$MANPATH:/var/qmail/man

Redirecting the superuser's mail

With Qmail, for security reasons, the superuser (or root) cannot receive mail directly. His/her email must therefore be redirected to a special account, by editing the file .qmail-root (all files whose name begins with a full stop are hidden files) located in the directory /var/qmail/alias:

cd /var/qmail/alias
cat > .qmail-root
your_user_account
^D

Choosing the mailbox format

With Qmail, you can choose a mailbox format, meaning the way that users' messages are stored. The format "Maildir" is used for storing users' messages directly into their work directory (hence the reason for creating Maildir in the skeleton).

Thus, in order to use this mailbox format, you must enter the following commands:

cd /var/defaultdelivery
cp -f mdir rc

Configuring Qmail

In order to be able to use Qmail, it still has to be configured, particularly the control files found in the directory /var/qmail/control :

• me

  contains the name of the email server

• defaultdomain

  contains the default domain name

• locals

  contains all names/aliases on the mail server

• rcpthosts

  contains the name of the domains authorised to use the mail server to send email

• cd /var/qmail/control

• cat > me
  tuxserver
  ^D

• cat > me
  tuxserver
  ^D

• cat > defaultdomain
  tuxdomain
  ^D

• cat > locals
  tuxserver
  tuxserver.tuxdomain
  smtp
  smtp.tuxdomain
  ^D

• cat > rcpthosts
  tuxdomain
  .tuxdomain
  ^D

Launching services

The following commands are used to manually launch the services required by the email server:

/etc/rc.d/init.d/qmail.init start 
/etc/rc.d/init.d/qmail-smtpd.init start 
/etc/rc.d/init.d/qmail-pop3d.init start

chkconfig --level 345 qmail on 
chkconfig --level 345 qmail-smtpd on 
chkconfig --level 345 qmail-pop3d on 
chkconfig --level 0126 qmail off 
hkconfig --level 0126 qmail-smtpd off 
chkconfig --level 0126 qmail-pop3d off 

Michel Maudet

Last update on Thursday October 16, 2008 02:43:14 PM.