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Machinet mailserver try to integrate some popular technologies in a powerful and easy to install mail system.
It include postfix (http://www.postfix.org) dovecot ( http://www.dovecot.org) openldap ( http://www.openldap.org) and roundcube ( http://www.roundcube.net) with specific plugins along with phpladapadmin ( http://phpldapadmin.sourceforge.net) and gnarwl
There are also specific templates, configuration scripts included in a separate machinet package.

The idea is to keep the main components as standard as possible ( to use distribution packages if possible) and to use configuration scripts, templates etc to integrate them.

I currently use slackware, but the setup must work for all distributions ( with few changes regarding initialisation scripts and file location.

The idea is to provide address book support, which tend to be a "must" today. After intense readings , i find the kolab project ( http://www.kolab.org) who match my opinion about storing personal address book and calendar ( in special imap folders). However I don't want to replicate kolab (I will explain later why) but there is a lot of well done useful work in it. I use kolab format for store contacts and some libraries. This allow me to use kmail and patches available for thunderbird and Outlook ( not tested)

Regarding postfix, we need a standard package with ldap and dovecot authentication.
I compiled it myself for slackware http://mihai.badici.ro/linux/postfix-2.9.2-i486-1mb.tgz but probably your distribution already has one.

There are no changes required. The install script will replace main.cf and master.cf with customized version and will ad some ldap-specific .cf files

Dovecot is compiled with ldap support and the metadata patch.

The metadata patch is needed to mark special folders ( Contacts, Calendar). The mail system will work without the patch, except kolab extensions.
The slackware package is here:
http://mihai.badici.ro/linux/dovecot-with-metadata-2.1.10-i486-2mb.tgz . I think Debian and CentOS must provide compiled packages.
Note: I encountered a bug (with the help of Aleksander Machniak (kolab-syncroton developer) in versions of plugins prior to 11 who prevents the registration of mobile phone. So I updated the dovecot package with the new patch.
More at: https://sourceforge.net/p/machinetmail/wiki/Dovecot-metadata/#b11a

The install script also will replace /etc/dovecot config files.

Openldap is unmodified. Since slackware package is compiled client-only, I just recompiled it with --with-slapd option.

http://mihai.badici.ro/linux/openldap-server-2.4.23-i486-1mb.txz

The install script will overwrite slapd.conf, will add ISPEnv2.schema and will populate the directory with initial skeleton.

Note: all configuration will use dc=machinet as base. If you want to change that, you must perform a find & replace on template files and also on ldap-specific files in postfix, dovecot, roundcube and so on.
At the moment there is no script provided to do that; will be nice, but is not a priority at the moment.

I read a lot to find a suitable webmail. And I returned to the first option and the most popular, roundcube, at the end.
Roundcube conflict with the idea of KISS because it use SQL for personal data storage. However, there are lot of useful plugins for ldap and also some kolab plugins already done. I will adapt and reuse part of them, because I don't want to install Horde framework for that.
I hope in the future will be possible to replace SQL database with IMAP storage, but this is not a priority at he moment.

The directory management is provided by phpldapadmin. It's a little bit slow, but i was amazed how versatile it is. I can manage a rather complex directory with few ( in fact, two) templates.
So, if your distribution provide phpldapadmin, use it. If not, there is a customized version in my machiNET.tgz package.

A note about php here:
I didn't find a php library for ldap extended operation to change password . In 2012 we don't crypt passwords in php scripts, but that's the case in both phpldapadmin and roundcube password plugin. I will try to find or write one when possible. It's seems minor, but i find is ridiculous not to have such library.

I use z-push for mobile access. There are some extensions in kolab project for contact syncronisation but at the moment only e-mail works in my setup.
Note: I successfully tested kolab-syncroton and roundcube 0.9 from kolab project for contacts and calendar. I will use them in next setups instead z-push and roundcube 0.8.

Finally, there is gnarwl (http://www.onyxbits.de/gnarwl).
I use it as it is, with some changes in config.
A year ago, i started a project called machiNET autoresponder. The initial version http://freecode.com/projects/machinet-autoresponder is incomplete and it crash; I tested a new version who seems to be more stable. But because it works as a content filter, I must to be sure is not crashing before I use it. So at the moment I stay on gnarwl; even if it crash, it's not big deal, the mail system will not stop.
With machinet autoresponder I will implement also some useful features like subject logging, keyword logging and probably even dkim signing, but I have no time to spend on it at the moment.

The machinet suite ( scripts ,config and web components) are at:
http://mihai.badici.ro/linux/machiNET-0.1-mb.tgz

Last edit: Mihai Badici 2012-10-19

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