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ylluminate
Asked: 2019-10-21 09:23:56 +0800 CST

How to compile msmtp from source, install in the proper location and install a service startup script for 18.04?

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I've found that the msmtp package for Ubuntu 18.04 is old and missing a component. The current included package is version 1.6.6 from 2016-11-14 and is missing msmtpd. I would like to install version 1.8.6 from 2019-09-27 that is significantly updated and does include msmtpd.

What are the proper configuration arguments that would get this to compile with appropriate make install locations for Ubuntu 18.04?

Additionally, what would be the process for creating a quick /etc/init.d/ startup script for this so as to make sure that this service starts at boot-up and can be restarted easily?

A simle ./configure gives the following output, which appears to be missing TLS and I don't think /usr/local is the preferred folder from the other package's defaults:

Install prefix ......... : /usr/local
NLS support ............ : yes
TLS support ............ : no (Library: none)
IDN support ............ : yes (no library required)
GNU SASL support ....... : no (most likely unnecessary)
Libsecret support (GNOME): no
MacOS X Keychain support : no
Build msmtpd ............: yes
software-installation compiling apt

1 Answers

  1. First, /usr/local is usually where manually installed packages go (/usr/local/bin). This will override any packages in /usr/bin or other directories used by apt installed packages.

    Next, install the build dependencies:

    sudo apt build-dep msmtp

    Now, cd into the msmtp directory and run the following commands:

    make clean
./configure
make
sudo make install

    This will install to the correct location which is /usr/local. When you install to this directory, you do not need to uninstall the apt version so that packages that depend on msmtp will not break. When you or the system runs msmtp, the version in /usr/local will be used.

    To uninstall, cd into the msmtp directory and run the following command:

    sudo make uninstall
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