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Re: Sendmail, qmail or Postfix??

2002-01-15 08:20:37
At 20:04 2002-01-14 -0800, Mark Turrin wrote:
Please post any thoughts you might have on these mail programs.

I trust you're going to summarize and produce a FAQ for other users, with special emphasis on procmail integration? If not, then this request is VERY misplaced.

Which one works the best with procmail?

All three are known to work with procmail, and many linux distros which use Sendmail actually have procmail set up as the LDA right out of the box. Some distros use either of the other two MTAs, or something entirely different (Exim comes to mind).

Once the message is passed off to procmail, and so long as the mailer handles the return value from the LDA, so far as procmail is concerned, they're really not different.

Which mailer has the best tools for eliminating spam?

All of them - they all support procmail (well, these four at least). If you're looking for specifics about those mailers, that is well outside the scope of this forum, which is about the use of procmail, not about generic anti-spam methods and MTAs. That's the truth.

The opinion offered by anyone in this matter is just that - an opinion. One coloured by different experiences (or lack thereof) and weighed heavily by whatever their chosen distribution happens to install by default. Those of us who take a proactive role in dealing with spam and armouring our systems from mail exploits will generally be happy with whatever tool we use because we've familiarized ourselves with it - those who don't act proactively (or do so in an ill-defined fashion) will have horror stories, and as often is the case, will immediatley blame the tools they're using, even if it could have been prevented by using those tools properly.

I've seen people shoot themselves in the foot quite effectively with different tools (procmail is certainly one, as is an ill-configured MTA). I've also seen some people unable to find an available pro for some tools because they chose to use something other than the common standard (in terms of MTAs, the common standard would be sendmail - documentation is abundant, and many people have used it for a long time and are familiar with its features).

"Quick, I need to refuse all the email coming from server xyz.tld!"

"I need to forward all of user so-and-so's email to their new account at the Topeka office."

"Joe's mailbox is being overrun by mailbombs - we need to refuse mail and tell people to call the office for a new contact address."

If you can't deal with these (and other) issues quickly, you shouldn't be administering a mail server, or should find a software package with which you can accmplish such things (and many others) quickly. That's going to be a matter of personal preference and specific features you're looking for. Choosing and operating a mail server isn't just a matter of installing and running it - it includes administering it. Changes may not be applied on a daily basis, but often when they're needed, they're needed in a hurry.

I'd be VERY surprised if there are not already several comparisons published on the web. A simple web search containing just the various MTA names found a quick truth table of basic features in several MTAs, it is however, 2.5 years dated and was based on one persons evaluation:

        <http://msgs.securepoint.com/cgi-bin/get/postfix9907/60/1.html>

Another report based on bulk (i.e. list) mail performance, equally dated:

        <http://www.kyoto.wide.ad.jp/mta/eval1/eindex.html>

Deja (ok, Google if you must) would be a good resource for checking into already performed comparisions of MTAs.


As an aside, one of the plusses for postfix is that Weitse Venema (author of TCP Wrappers, quite probably the single most widely used security tool on *nix boxes) is the primary developer.

If you want to switch MTAs, your best choice will only be revealed after a thorough evaluation of the options by yourself, or a trusted technical advisor ("advice by committee" doesn't count). Whatever choice you settle on should be something YOU are prepared to administer.

Mail filtering should not be your sole criteria - security, robusness, speed, and even user features (extensible security such as SMTP AUTH springs to mind - that being a feature that permits you to authenticate users as they SEND mail through your mail server, and thus, limits the ability of your server to be abused by spammers or even simply users trying to masquerade as another system user) should all be part of the evaluation.

---
 Sean B. Straw / Professional Software Engineering

 Procmail disclaimer: <http://www.professional.org/procmail/disclaimer.html>
 Please DO NOT carbon me on list replies.  I'll get my copy from the list.

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