Home / server / Questions / 216083
In Process
TheOne
Asked: 2010-12-26 08:46:19 +0800 CST

Simple mail server setup for a user-based website

  • 772

I am working on a simple website that has user registration. All I need to do is confirm email addresses by emailing a confirmation email and maybe send out periodic emails regarding various information. I am also considering having a [email protected] email for user questions and comments. The application is written in django and I am running it on ArchLinux on a VPS.

I have no knowledge of mail servers. I tried setting up postfix and qmail but had no luck. They are complicated and require a lot of configuration to get them working properly.

My use case is super simple and doesn't not require anything fancy.

Is there any simple mailing setup that will enable me to quickly get emailing working with my django app with minimal work?

email django email-server

2 Answers

  1. I am not familiar with ArchLinux but most distributions come with packages for MTAs and a basic setup for sending mails. As long as you only want to send mails from your VPS, such a basic setup is enough for the first step.

    Example setup for Postfix (snippet from /etc/postfix/main.cf):

    myhostname = mydomain.com
alias_maps = hash:/etc/aliases
alias_database = hash:/etc/aliases
myorigin = /etc/mailname
mydestination = mydomain.com, localhost
mynetworks = 127.0.0.0/8 [::ffff:127.0.0.0]/104 [::1]/128
mailbox_size_limit = 0
recipient_delimiter = +
inet_interfaces = loopback-only

    Second step is more difficult: Proper DNS setup, signing with Domainkey etc to (better) pass spam filters. This will need more reading. And if you also want to receive mails, you should read one or two books about this topic since there is no simple solution (from a professional point of view).

    • 2

  2. If you just want to send emails (and not receiving any) then don't install a full-fledged email system but just use sendEmail, it's the simplest way (I use it a lot in my Nagios scripts). It's a command-line email program, with a lot of options and it accepts various inputs (you can format an HTML page and pipe it to it).

    • 0