Deluged by spam

[Feathers McGraw]

Ah... I think I may have misunderstood, it seems it's just calling a compatibility interface, rather than sendmail. Makes sense, since I haven't actually installed sendmail!

http://www.postfix.org/sendmail.1.html

[SteveRiley]

Huh, I didn't know about that. Interesting.

[Feathers McGraw]

I would recommend simply creating a Sieve rule in your mail client to do this. That way, Dovecot remains in charge of delivery, and the Sieve rule, which actually runs on the server, moves the mail for you.

I'm confused, if the sieve rule is set up in K9/Thunderbird, then how does it run on the server?

[SteveRiley]

Sieve rules (a script, actually) are not the same as client rules. While it's true that you typically use your mail client to construct your Sieve script, the script actually lives within your account on the Dovecot server. When Dovecot receives mail from Postfix, it passes each message through your Sieve script. Sieve provides a way to perform server-side message filtering. This is better than client-side filtering because it eliminates the need to repeat rules on each client (think: desktop, laptop, tablet, phone) and ensures that all your various clients have a consistent view of your mailbox.

KMail has supported the creation of Sieve scripts for quite some time. Recent versions have added a visual editor, a welcome enhancement. Roundcube also has a visual Sieve script creator.

Here's a sample of what's in mine:

require ["fileinto","body"];
# rule:[spam]
if anyof (header :contains "Subject" "*SPAM*", header :contains "Subject" "**SPAM**", header :contains "Subject" "***SPAM***")
{
	fileinto "Junk";
	stop;
}
# rule:[Kubuntu Forums]
if header :contains "From" "support@kubuntuforums.net"
{
	fileinto "Lists/Kubuntu Forum";
	stop;
}
# rule:[Kubuntu-users]
if anyof (header :contains "To" "kubuntu-users@lists.ubuntu.com", header :contains "Cc" "kubuntu-users@lists.ubuntu.com")
{
	fileinto "Lists/Kubuntu-users";
	stop;
}
# rule:[Kubuntu-devel]
if anyof (header :contains "To" "kubuntu-devel@lists.ubuntu.com", header :contains "Cc" "kubuntu-devel@lists.ubuntu.com")
{
	fileinto "Lists/Kubuntu-devel";
	stop;
}
# rule:[Subscriptions]
if anyof (header :contains "To" "chd@lists.quackwatch.org", header :contains "To" "newsoftheweird@googlegroups.com", header :contains "To" "bobparks-whatsnew@listserv.umd.edu")
{
	fileinto "Lists/Subscriptions";
	stop;
}
# rule:[KDE-announce]
if anyof (header :contains "To" "kde-announce@kde.org", header :contains "To" "kde-announce-apps@kde.org", header :contains "Cc" "kde-announce@kde.org", header :contains "Cc" "kde-announce-apps@kde.org")
{
	fileinto "Lists/KDE-announce";
	stop;
}
# rule:[Horn List]
if anyof (header :contains "To" "horn@yahoogroups.com", header :contains "Cc" "horn@yahoogroups.com", header :contains "To" "horn@nbbc.us", header :contains "Cc" "horn@nbbc.us", header :contains "To" "horn@bogusville.us", header :contains "Cc" "horn@bogusville.us")
{
	fileinto "Lists/Horn List";
	stop;
}

Postfix accepts inbound mail, then Dovecot receives it from Postfix and sorts it into folders according to the rules in my Sieve script. Whenever I open any mail client, messages are already sorted appropriately. Sieve is very cool.

[Feathers McGraw]

Very well explained, thanks! That's very cool, I'll have to have a crack at that myself.

It took me a while to realise the "horn" stuff is probably something innocent - of the French Horn variety? - and not any of the things that flashed through my mind initially!

[SteveRiley]

No, your first intuition was correct

You're probably going to make Simon blush again.

[Feathers McGraw]

Pahaha

[Feathers McGraw]

Just wanted to say, I have just got Spamassassin and Dovecot LMTP* with Sieve working on my mail server.

Sieve is really cool! I'm so glad you mentioned it or I would never have known about it.

Still to do: set up managesieve. Not because I really need it but because it sounds cool!

Thanks

Edit: LMTP not LDAP!!

[GreyGeek]

mmm... have you noticed that Steve hasn't been since Feb 27th
Must be at a presentation or working hard on something? (Rearranging this forum?)

[Feathers McGraw]

Yeah I thought that was strange too, I actually emailed him a couple of days ago... all is well, he's just busy working/travelling etc

[SteveRiley]

Sieve is really cool! I'm so glad you mentioned it or I would never have known about it.

There is much to like about modern email systems. Learning to run a complete email server of your own is probably one of the most educational endeavors a person can undertake.

Still to do: set up managesieve. Not because I really need it but because it sounds cool!

You need it if you want to manage your Sieve scripts using KMail's built-in script editor. Managesieve is a standard protocol for remotely editing scripts; see RFC 5804.

mmm... have you noticed that Steve hasn't been since Feb 27th
Must be at a presentation or working hard on something? (Rearranging this forum?)

March is ball-bustingly busy month for me; always has been. I'm either speaking, or planning to speak, or traveling for customer meetings, or getting ready for HONK!TX. Check out our promo pix:

[GreyGeek]

Welcome back!

[Feathers McGraw]

I finally got around to adding Managesieve. I really like Kmail's implementation

[SteveRiley]

Yeah, the graphical editor is quite nice. That's a relatively recent addition; previously, you had to type your sieve scripts manually. I would instead use Roundcube's editor. No need to do that now, of course.

[Feathers McGraw]

When I went shopping for an SSL certificate, the price for wildcard domain validation was two to three times as much as simple domain validation. So I bought the simple.

Sorry to resurrect this thread, but I remembered talking about this before, so...

Recently, Google announced it will bump up sites using SSL by default in search engine results, so I'm considering getting a "proper" SSL cert signed by a widely recognised root CA so that I can go https by default.

I'm also considering configuring some kind of Jabber (+VoIP*) server for my family, and it's not feasible to root all of my family's devices and install the CAcert root certificate on them...

In your opinion, are there any companies I should avoid using?

I don't need any in-depth verification, I just need it to be installed by default on Ubuntu, Android, Windows etc. and if there are any companies with dodgy business practices like GoDaddy I'll make an effort to avoid them.

Also, it looks like wildcard certs are ten times (£55/yr vs £5/yr!) more expensive than normal ones, so I may have to do some re-configuration. It's actually cheaper to buy a second domain name and cert than it is to get a wildcard certificate and use another subdomain!





* may require a second IP address for STUN... but that's another question.