Server send mail

[MrNemesis]

HI



basically i have a server running a forum and it has the ability to send out emails and whatnot, so i'm curious what i would install to allow it to do this and how would one set it up..

it has no dns, at the moment its just an ip
also i'm on shawcable, so would it be possible to configure whatever i have to install to send mail using "shawmail"

thx
chris

 

[Norwich]

A lot would depend on what the forum software is but most UNIX based systems would use a local sendmail or SMTP mail interface (that is, assuming the sendmail executable is available - or will talk SMTP to TCP port 25 on the local machine.


Installing sendmail would be able to handle it - but a more simple solution may be to install a version of 'postfix' - which also has a psudo 'sendmail' binary which mimics the sendmail binary proper.

You would not necessarily need to have a proper domain name though you may need to reference a remote DNS server if you were to send mail externally - unless you routed all mail via your ISP.

Also, you would need to consider what to do with locally delivered mail as I would think most forum software would requite local administartion email addresses.

 

[RhythmAce]

If you don't have your own domain name, you will need to use the 'smtp' option in your forum script. Most scripts are setup to use either sendmail or your isp. As Norwich noted, you won't be able to have local mail. Just setup the script to use your isp mail account. Your users will have to have their own valid e-mail address.

 

[Norwich]

Technically, you can have your own domainname - but locally only - such as boardadmin@linuxhost.localdomain.

You could also run your own SMTP or sendmail server but outbound mail would have to be aliased to substitute a 'proper' domain. One benefit with postfix is that it can be more easily run with an external domain name. Eg. as jdoe.myisp.net - Which is useful if you have such an ISP account where you are assigned a username identifier in the domain part of available addresses