Topic: Wanting understanding of the email processing inside the sme smtp server?

[purvis]

I cannot seem to find what I might call the low down on the sme's  smtp server.
This has always confused me about the linux server and what actually sme email processing is doing
What i would like to know are the tools(programs) and the process of which an email goes through on the server.
The wiki email does not quiet explain to me how things work and which programs are doing what and when.
This would go a long way to my understanding of the emailing part of the server.
I am not much interested in the webmail horde program as that would be similiar to a email client, I would so pose.
I am interested in what does what and when. I have many books but they are not specific to sme.
Maybe if there where wiki kind of answer where different members could edit it.
Without the kind of knowledge of how the sme treats email i am looking for, it is difficult for me to makes suggesting or add to improving the sme server.

[janet]

purvis

Google
qpsmtpd
and
sqpsmtpd
(the secure version of qpsmtpd)
There is more than that of course, but when you have read and digested a good few of all those hits, that should take you a long way to understanding how the sme mail system work.

[purvis]

Mary,
I did that before.  That tells me very little about what is going on inside the sme server
sendmail ?   qmail ?  Maildir ? etc etc.
I know that qpsmtpd is written in perl and has plugins but still that is not enough of what from what i see.

[purvis]

What I would be looking for is a summary in the form of a 123 listing if that where possible.
For me, I just can't see the forest for the trees.

[mmccarn]

qpsmtpd / sqpsmtpd
"incoming" smtp connections are handled by qpsmtpd.  This includes email from outside intended for local recipients and email from your SME users being relayed to internal or external destinations.  Starting somewhat recently (SME 7.51, maybe?) the default for SME user email relay has been to require a secure connection - ie sqpsmtpd.

qpsmtpd does all of the spam & virus checking before passing the message on to qmail.

qmail
qpsmtpd always delivers email to qmail for delivery.  qmail will either deliver the email into a local mailbox, or connect to an appropriate remote server and deliver it there.

dovecot
mailbox access on your SME server uses dovecot (but I don't understand exactly what this means)

I recommend reading through these pages:
http://wiki.contribs.org/Mail_log_file_analysis
http://wiki.contribs.org/Email_Statistics

[purvis]

mmccarn thank you
that helped clear up some of my thoughts
and is outgoing mail the same too.

[mmccarn]

...is outgoing mail the same too.

This includes ... email from your SME users being relayed to internal or external destinations