BhumiTat - Re-engineering with innovations - Email Server and collaboration suite Ubuntu iRedMail

In this article, I will walk you through step by step process to setup you in-house email server. Hosting in-house requires that you set up and mange your own e-mail server, which gives you a little more flexibility and control. Since you are not paying for storage, you can make e-mail accounts as large as you want, add accounts easily, or host multiple domains. Since you are maintaining the server, you can control what kind of spam and virus protection you are running and make sure that the software stays up-to-date.

Get managed Cloud hosted VM preinstalled with iRedMail at Gavedu Cloud and start using instantly. It will save you time, resources and a lot of money.

iRedMail on Ubuntu 20.04.

iRedMail is a open source mail server solution. The right way to build your mail server with open source software. With iRedMail, you can deploy an open source, fully fledged, full-featured mail server in several minutes, for free.

iRedMail setup script will install following software:

1. Postfix – A mail transfer agent (MTA)
2. Dovecot – An IMAP and POP3 server
3. Nginx – A web server
4. OpenLDAP – LDAP server for storing mail accounts or a MySQL, MariaDB or PostgreSQL server for storing mail accounts.
5. SpamAssassin – A spam scanner
6. ClamAV – A virus scanner
7. Amavisd – An interface between Postfix, SpamAssassin and ClamAV
8. iRedAPD – Postfix policy server

Install iRedMail on Ubuntu 20.04

Prerequisites

1. A Fresh Ubuntu 20.04 server or KVM VPS with minimum 2GB RAM but it is recommend to use atleast 4GB RAM
2. Port 25 unblocked.
3. Fully qualified domain name (FQDN) hostname.
4. A non-blacklisted IP address.
5. A root user access or normal user with administrative privileges.

Let’s start with the installation.

1. Keep the server up to date

# apt update -y

# apt upgrade -y

You are now ready to install iRedMail. Download the latest version of iRedMail using wget. You can find the latest build by visiting the iRedMail download page.

# wget https://github.com/iredmail/iRedMail/archive/1.3.2.tar.gz

Extract the tarball and then cd to the directory.

# tar xvf 1.3.2.tar.gz

# cd iRedMail-1.3.2

Run the installation script using following command:

# bash iRedMail.sh

After you run the script, you will be asked few questions.

Welcome and thanks for your use

Specify location to store all mailboxes. Default is /var/vmail/.

Choose backend used to store mail accounts. You can manage mail accounts with iRedAdmin, our web-based iRedMail admin panel.

There’s no big difference between available backends, so it’s strongly recommended to choose the one you’re familiar with for easier management and maintenance after installation.

Add your first mail domain name

Set password of admin account of your first mail domain.

Note: This account is an admin account and a mail user. That means you can login to webmail and admin panel (iRedAdmin) with this account, login username is full email address.

Choose optional components

Which webmail should you choose? Roundcube or SOGo?

1. Roundcube is a fast and lightweight webmail, and webmail only. If all you need is a webmail to access mailbox and manage mail filters, then Roundcube is the best option.
2. SOGo offers webmail, calendar (CalDAV), contacts (CardDAV) and ActiveSync. If you need calendar and contacts support, also syncing them to mobile or PC mail client applications, then SOGo is the one to go. Note: If you have many ActiveSync clients, it requires a lot RAM.
3. It’s ok to install both, but you can only manage mail filters with Roundcube in this case, because the filter rules generated by Roundcube and SOGo are not compatible. You can force to enable it in SOGo, but please inform end users and ask them to stick to one of them for managing mail filters.

After answered above questions, iRedMail installer will ask you to review and confirm to start installation. It will install and configure required packages automatically. Type y or Y and press Enter to start.

After all the required packages are installed and configured, reboot your server.

# reboot

After rebooting, you can access the web admin page at https://mail.example.com/iredadmin using your domain. To access your mail, use the Roundcube page at https://mail.example.com/mail.

You may find, however, that the cost of updating security software eats up some of the money you are saving by hosting in-house. You are also left with the responsibility of backing up the e-mail and making sure that you store the backed-up data in a separate, safe location.

Given the importance e-mail plays in modern business, it’s critical to think through how you want your e-mail managed and by whom. You probably won’t be able to avoid the disappointment that comes if and when the office e-mail goes down, but you will at least know you selected a trusted party to fix it.

Get managed Cloud hosted VM preinstalled with iRedMail at Gavedu Cloud and start using instantly. It will save you time, resources and a lot of money.