building a messaging server part one
Introduction
This series will explain how to build your own Messaging Server. Services will include hosting email, sending and receiving email, and instant messaging with Jabber.
The server will also support virtual domains. This means that several different domain names will be able to send and receive mail from this server. There are a couple different methods to hosting virtual domains. The method used in this series will create virtual users that are completely separate from the system and used only for email.
Software Used
A wide variety of software will be used to create the server. Postfix will be the main email server that will control sending and receiving email. For email retrieval, Dovecot will be used. Jabber 1.4 will support the instant messages. A ton of Python code will glue everything together. Finally, Debian will be the Linux distribution used.
No database or any other large piece of software will be used. The user accounts and information will be stored in plain text files. This setup can comfortably run on a small server with 64mb of RAM (what I'm currently using).
Getting Started
There are several books and articles written about setting up your own Debian server. I will assume you have one created and ready to go.
The name of the server used in the series will be mail.server1.local. It will host email for domains server1.local and server2.local.
Feedback
As with all of my articles, I encourage feedback in the form of comments, flames, questions, or ideas to build upon. I definitely don't claim to be an expert at this, so any help and pointers are greatly appreciated.
