So, as the topic says, I’m going to set up a self hosted email service for myself, family and friends. I know that this one is a controversial topic around here, but trust me when I say I know what I’m getting into. I’ve had a small hosting business for years and I’ve had my share of issues with microsoft and others, I know how to set things up and keep them running and so on.

However, on the business side we used both commercial solution and a dirt-cheap service with just IMAPS/SMTPS and webmail with roundcube. Commercial one (Kerio Connect, neat piece of software, check it out if you need one) is something I don’t want to pay for anymore (even if their pricing is pretty decent, it’s still money out from my pocket).

I know for sure I can rely to bog-standard postfix+dovecot+spamassassin -combo, and it will work just fine for plain email. However, I’d really like to have calendar and contacts in the mix as well and as I’ve only worked with commercial solution for the last few years I’m not up to speed on what the newest toys can offer.

I’m not that strict on anything, but the thing needs to run on linux and it must have the most basic standards supported, like messages stored on maildir-format (simplifies migration to other platform if things change), support for sieve (or other commonly supported protocol) and contacts/calendar need to work with pretty much anything (android, ios, linux, windows, mac…) without extra software on client end (*DAV excluded, those are fine in my books). And obviously the thing needs to work with imaps, smtps, dkim and other necessities, but that should be implied anyways.

I know that things like zimbra, sogo and iredmail exist, but as mentioned, it’s been a while since I’ve played with things like that, so what are your recommendations for setup like this today?

  • mrinfinity@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    For self-hosting, be mindful IP addresses have reputation scores and your IP needs to build them up positively. You need to have reverse DNS set, DKIM, SPF records etc for a more trusted reputation, domain reputation etc to not be flagged and sent to spam folders. I just got the $1/month Proton E-Mail for 10 addresses for 1 custom domain as I didn’t feel like dealing with any of this with self hosting, but props for going the self-hosting route.

    • pHr34kY@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      ISPs often have SMTP relay servers. If you hook into that, your mail gets instant street cred.

  • tapdattl@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    I’ve been playing with Stalwart-Email as a combined SMTP/IMAP server. Its open source and written in rust, still pretty early in development and I haven’t played with it enough to give any real opinion on the pluses or minuses compared to other software, but its worth taking a look at.

    • aksdb@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      Stalwart is 95% awesome. What holds me back is, that Mails are stored in a Database and not Maildir. Maildir is insanely trivial to backup incrementally and to restore individual mails if necessary. That currently holds me on dovecot.

    • gregordinary@lemmy.ml
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      3 months ago

      Currently using Stalwart after about a decade of using iRedMail. Stalwart’s setup was such a breeze; I let out an audible laugh/noise when the install completed in the blink of an eye and had all the DKIM, DMARC, SPF, etc. settings available for config.

      Making some nice improvements with each release too, proper user management, etc. Definitely a fan. Looking forward to when they support CalDAV and CardDAV.

  • nomad@infosec.pub
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    3 months ago

    My stack is postfix, dovecot, slapd for accounts, SoGO for web mail, calendar and task and contact management. Syncs to my phone via davx and just works out of the box. It’s multi domain and my small company even sells hosted email services.

    Rspamd for anti spam and dkim. Use a free email testing service to confirm SPF etc are setup correctly.

    Also make sure you have regular backups and up to date lets encrypt certificates.

  • CaptSpify@lemmy.today
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    3 months ago

    I have Dovecot and Postfix running on Debian on a server in my closet. Works great for my needs

    • treadful@lemmy.zip
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      3 months ago

      I like exim a bit more but yeah. The dead simple solution is my goto. It can be tricky without any experience but there’s a ton of information out there.

      And once you set it up your pretty good almost indefinitely.

    • Lucy :3@feddit.org
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      3 months ago

      Same (but arch btw). It uses the existing Let’s Encrypt certificate from certbot --nginx. I did everything possible advised by mxtoolbox (Blocklists, DMARC, SPF, DKIM, LIGMA and whatnot). Some things are hard or impossible, but not really needed, like reverse dns or DNS SOA.

      • IsoKiero@sopuli.xyzOP
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        3 months ago

        Oh, I forgot to mention, I’m going to run the whole thing on a VPS, so I’ll have access to proper reverse dns and all, so that’s not an issue.

    • Zak@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      I’ve been using Maddy for about a year. It’s easy to set up and has been trouble free.

  • rhabarba@feddit.org
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    3 months ago

    Honestly, what I use is not what I would recommend. ;-) My own setup follows these directions (TL;DR: OpenBSD, as much OOTB OpenBSD software as possible, and Dovecot.)

  • SwizzleStick@lemmy.zip
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    3 months ago

    I’ve stuck with iredmail for years. Spin up a VM, grab the installer, and see how it performs for you.

  • multicolorKnight@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    I have been using modoboa, my installation is fine as far as it goes, but coming up a little short technologically these days, and the upgrade path is total replace. If you have or install Docker on your server, there are poste.io and docker-mailsever,which both look good. Running your mailserver in a container or VM is almost essential, for security, and so you can blow it away and start over if you make a mistake.

    Running an email server is not necessarily hard, but it is stressful: if you have other users, even family, they will take it for granted when it works, and complain loudly when it does not. Like any server that others use. But, beyond security, I have a certain stubborn geek machismo about it, it’s a level of sysadmin above basic.

  • dingdongitsabear@lemmy.ml
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    3 months ago

    this isn’t addressing the technical side per se, but consider your user’s rebelling factor, i.e. them passively resisting using the stuff you provide and sticking with corpo-crap.

    not to go into details, but I’ve got a number of opensource solutions in place for various clients. we have huge some issues with users who need to be corralled and coerced into using the provided messengers, web portals, and such. some resist out of habit, other’s because they prefer the infinitely more polished UX of assorted spyware as opposed to the janky feel and rather rudimental features of opensource alternatives (think gmail vs roundcube).

    • IsoKiero@sopuli.xyzOP
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      3 months ago

      The couple of domains have been running on my company so the userbase is already there, but as I’m shutting down the business side they need to move to something else. And I don’t really care if users want to switch to something else, that’s not my problem.