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Recommendations for the Right IMAP Server?
"I'm still at a loss for what to do. The documentation of all but uw-imap seem to be a bit complex for me. If it helps, I'd like to point out that I have Mutt and nbsmtp installed, which work fine for connecting to our SMTP and POP servers. How do I know what will serve our needs the best? Also, is there an IMAP server that I could install easily for testing and learning purposes? I'd like to be able to get something installed without much configuration. Security shouldn't be an issue for testing purposes, because it will only be on the local network, and the computer will be turned off when I'm not actively testing it. We're also willing to purchase products as well. We're willing to hire a professional to do it for us, but the boss wanted some research done so that we know what we're getting. Any comments are welcome. Thanks in advance."
I use Cyrus in a number of my packaged configurations, but for ease of migration and security Dovecot seems promising, although it lacks many of the advanced features that Cyrus has. It would probably be helpful to know exactly how many users you'll be serving and what your mail volume is. You might drop by #cyrus on irc.freenode.net and chat with people there.
You could, of course, look around and hire a Linux consultant to set it up for you.
Wil
wiki
First rule of being a sysadmin: You NEVER put a compiler on a production server. Ever. All software (including updates) is compiled and tested on a dev machine (preferably on a disconnected network), then moved to the production machine once you're satisfied that it won't break anything. This pretty much precludes Gentoo.
True. True. False. It is relatively easy to build and package on your Gentoo dev machine and then merge to your production servers.
Stability is not measured in point releases. Stability is measured by testing. As in you testing, in your configuration.
So why not take it to the next step and apply your patches, enable your config flags, do your compiling, what you said.
Pat doesn't include anything he hasn't tested.
This seems to contradict your point #2, or is Pat considered your testing. All the Gentoo naysayers loath the clueless newbie Gentoo cheerleading, but then mindlessly parrot back those same statements as evidence of its weakness. Gentoo is a very powerful concept in *skilled* hands. You never hear the same b*tching about *BSD ports.
What distibution do you recommend for this
Since the asker of the question does not seem to be skilled in linux, I would recommend going with an *appliance* distribution, i.e. one where all the choices have been made for you and the configuration required is minimal. Netmax is an example of such an appliance distribution based on RedHat, but I am sure you could find others that are better, cheaper (free), or based on other distributions.
Logic is not Divine.
University of Washington IMAP has known security holes (unless they recently patched it), Courier-IMAP and cyrus would probably work just fine, but as for me I'm just waiting for the James email server to finish their IMAP implementation. It is a nice, open, easy to use, non-*nix centric, and java based solution. Which supports java maillets which let you custom process each email on the server. Not to mention the fact that they have two different IMAP implementations already in CVS (all they have to do is adapt one of them which is in the process now). Just my two cents.
Occam's razor is the blind faith in the natural selection of least resistance and in universal oversimplification. -- EF
This is actually a very good argument for installing Debian. All the software we have been talking about in this discussion (QMail, Sendmail, Postfix, Exim, Procmail, UW-IMAP, Courier-*, Cyrus,
Debian is (one of?) the largest free software efforts in the world - some 700+ volunteer developers. Various slashdot polls shows it as the #2 distribution in number of users (behind RedHat) among Slashdot readers.
All Debian-packaged software follows a strict policy (on everything from file hierarchy/locations to configurability).
It may not be the quickest/easiest distribution to install (yet!) but once you are done, you won't regret it.
I migrated to Debian (after SLS, Slackware, RedHat, SuSE) some 5+ years ago. I have never since set up a non-Debian Linux system.
All that said, I have never tried Gentoo. However, it sounds (from this and other discussions) as if it is also a very thought-through distribution - I'll perhaps try it out someday.
-tor
I agree with Tor (see above ^^), try Debian.
While I haven't used Gentoo yet, Debian is the easiest managed Linux system I've used so far (out of about 8 distros). If you can do Gentoo binary only, then I guess the only technical reason left to consider is which one is easier to manage.
Some reasons for Debian:
o Stable branch is bulletproof
o Security updates are thorough and timely (make sure you sign up to debian-security-announce!)
o apt-get absolutely rocks.
If gentoo is comparable to debian in those areas, and you're more comfortable with gentoo, then by all means that's better for you. I suggest you at least install debian on a box and play with it for a bit before making your decision though.