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added questions I asked on debianforum.de
author meillo@marmaro.de
date Sun, 19 Oct 2008 17:58:41 +0200
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1 \chapter{\unix\ \MTA{}s}
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3 This chapter introduces a group of \mta{}s.
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4 These will be presented to the reader in a short overview and with the most important facts.
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5 The next chapter will show a comparison of the candidates in several disciplines.
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8 \section{Types of \MTA{}s}
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9 ``Mail transfer agent'' is a term covering a variety of programs.
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10 One thing is common to them: they transport email from one \emph{thing} to another.
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11 These \emph{things} can be hosts, meaning independent machines, or protocols like \NAME{SMTP} and \NAME{UUCP}, between which mail is transfered.\footnote{\sendmail{}'s initial purpose was moving mail between \NAME{UUCP}, \name{Berknet} and \NAME{SMTP}.}
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13 Beside this common property, \MTA{}s can be very different.
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14 Some of them have \NAME{POP3} and/or \NAME{IMAP} servers included.
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15 Some can fetch mails through these protocols.
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16 Others have have every feature you can think of.
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17 And maybe there are some that do nothing else, but transporting email.
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20 \section{The ones not regarded here}
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21 The candidates for the competition in the next chapter are a subset of the \MTA{}s available.
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22 Comparision between totally different programs (apart of one function) makes not much sense.
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23 One would not use a program for a job it is not suited for.
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24 Therefor \mta{}s that are rarely similar to \masqmail\ are not regarded.
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26 The first group of programs to sort out are the so called \name{groupware} programs.
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27 These provide a whole lot of functions, including mail transfer, file storage, calendars, resource management, instant messaging and more.
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28 Examples for this kind of programs are: \name{Lotus Notes}, \name{Microsoft Exchange}, \name{OpenGroupware.org} and \name{eGroupWare}.
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30 The second group are the \name{relay-only} \MTA{}s.
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31 They transfer mail only to defined \name{smart hosts}\index{smart host}\footnote{\MTA{}s that receives email and route it to the actual destination}.
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32 Most \MTA{}s can be configured to act as such a forwarder.
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33 But this is normally an additional functionality.
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34 Examples for that group are: \name{nullmailer}, \name{ssmtp} and \name{esmtp}.
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36 Third, only \emph{sendmail-compatible} \MTA{}s will be regarded in the competition.
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37 Hence all \MTA{}s not having a \emph{sendmail-compatible} interface or not offering it as a compatibility addon, will not be covered here.
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38 The reason is the heavy reliance of \unix\ systems on the existance of a programs called \path{sendmail}.
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39 This has historical reasons. See section \ref{sec:sendmail} for further information.
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41 Further more, only programs with source code available are regarded. %FIXME: why
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44 \section{The competitors}
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45 The programs remaining are \emph{sendmail-compatible} ``smart'' \MTA{}s that do not offer masses of features unrelated to mail transport.
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47 For the comparision, five programs of this group are taken.
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48 These are: \sendmail, \name{qmail}, \name{postfix}, \name{exim} and \masqmail.
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49 The four alternatives to \masqmail\ are the most important representatives of the regarded group.
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50 %TODO: what about having one program as ``outsider'' ...?
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52 Other, but not covered, group members are: %FIXME: are these all MTAs of that group? why these and not others?
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53 %TODO: what about `courier-mta'?
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55 % http://www.yolinux.com/TUTORIALS/LinuxTutorialMailMTA.html
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56 % http://homepages.tesco.net/~J.deBoynePollard/Reviews/UnixMTSes/
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58 Here follows a small introduction to each of the five.
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60 \subsection{\sendmail}
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61 \sendmail\ is the most popular \mta.
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62 Since it was one of the first \MTA{}s and was shipped by many vendors of \unix\ systems.
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64 The program was written by Eric Allman as the successor of his program \name{delivermail}.
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65 \sendmail\ was first released with \NAME{BSD} 4.1c in 1983.
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66 Allman was not the only one working on the program.
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67 Other people developed own versions of it and a variety of flavors came up, especially in the late eighties when Allman was inactive.
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69 \sendmail\ is focused on transfering mails between different protocols and networks, this lead to a very flexible (though complex) configuration.
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71 The latest version is 8.14.3 from May 2008.
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72 Further development will go into the project \name{MeTA1} which succeeds \sendmail.
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74 More information can be found on the \sendmail\ homepage \citeweb{sendmail:homepage} and on \citeweb{wikipedia:sendmail} and \citeweb{jdebp}.
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75 %FIXME: license
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78 \subsection{\name{qmail}}
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79 \name{qmail} is seen by its community as ``a modern SMTP server which makes sendmail obsolete''.
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80 It was written by Daniel~J.\ Bernstein starting in 1995.
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81 His primary goal was to create a secure \MTA\ to replace the popular, but vulnerable, \sendmail.
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83 \name{qmail} first introduced may innovative concepts in \mta\ design and is generally seen as the first security-aware \MTA\ developed.
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85 Since November 2007, \name{qmail} is released in the \name{public domain} which makes it \freesw.
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86 The latest release is 1.03 from July 1998.
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88 The programs homepages are \citeweb{qmail:homepage1} and \citeweb{qmail:homepage2}. Further information about \name{qmail} is available on \citeweb{lifewithqmail}, \citeweb{wikipedia:qmail} and \citeweb{jdebp}.
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91 \subsection{\name{postfix}}
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92 %TODO: author, date of first release, basic intention of program, ...
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93 %TODO: references to various descriptions
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95 \subsection{\name{exim}}
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96 %TODO: author, date of first release, basic intention of program, ...
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97 %TODO: references to various descriptions
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99 \subsection{\masqmail}
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100 The \masqmail\ program was written by Oliver Kurth, starting in 1999.
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101 His aim was to create a \mta\ which is especially focused on computers with dial-up connections to the internet.
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102 \masqmail\ handles situations which are rarely solveable with the common \MTA{}s.
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103 %TODO: references to various descriptions
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106 % briefly discuss the border between small MTAs (sendmail, masqmail) and state-of-the-art mailservers (postfix) and groupware (notes, exchange): give usecases.