RE: [cobalt-users] POP3/IMAP Mailboxes

[Jeff Lasman <jblists@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 09:19 AM 1/15/00  David Harris wrote:

> Hello, Dan,
>
> Sorry, but as far as I know, that is absolutely NOT true.

No statement is every absolute.  Including this one <smile>.

> IHPs and ISP
> offer this service on Unix based machines all the time.

Agreed...

> I understand that
> technically, it may not be called a pop3 box - it may be called an IMAP box,
> but it is possible.

Both the standard POP3 and the standard IMAP implementations included with 
Red Hat linux and included with Cobalt boxes, work with one email box per 
user, that email box being the same as the login name and being unique on 
that computer.  That's true whether you use POP3 or IMAP.  IMAP does allow 
the user to set up additional "folder" (as I call them), but only the one 
in-box.

> I don't so much care about creating 2 logins with the
> user sales, just 2 email addresses without having to go through the whole
> alias thing (they can have whatever login they want).

So who's confused here, you or me?

What do you mean they can have "whatever login they want"?  No way can two 
people on the same box have the same login into two different accounts.  So 
the second buy who wants "joe" isn't going to be able to get it.  Period.

That said, the first guy can have joe1, and the second guy can have 
joe2.  And joe1 can get his mail at <joe@xxxxxxxxxxx>, and the second user 
at <joe@xxxxxxxxxxx>.

To set this up the first user is set up as joe1, and the second as 
joe2.  The first user gets set up in virtusertable as:

joe@xxxxxxxxxxx           joe1

while the second one gets set up as:

joe@xxxxxxxxxxx           joe2

Technically that's NOT an alias; that's a virtusertable entry.  Is that 
what you're writing about?

But you can't do that automatically on a rack, although you CAN do it 
behind the scenes, via ssh/telnet if you want.

Because of limitations on the rack, wherein the interface automatically writes

joe1@xxxxxxxxxxx           joe1
joe2@xxxxxxxxxxx           joe2

and so forth, you need to set up aliases as follows:

For <joe1@xxxxxxxxxxx> you need to set up <joe@xxxxxxxxxxx>, and for 
<joe2@xxxxxxxxxxx> you need to set up <joe@xxxxxxxxxxx>.

That's because of a limitation of the RaQ interface and limiations of 
unix/linux.

I've already gone over in another email how to do this with other software, 
but not of it would interface with the RaQ gui interface.

> All i am trying to do
> is allow many different users to use "sales@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx" as their own
> email address.  This doenst sound like a very big deal, does it?

I just told you how to do it.

> Can you
> imagine running a hosting company that offers full featured hosting plans
> that require users to use aliasing to acconmplish this?  That would not be
> very good.

Call 9netave and see how they do it.  They do it the way I described 
above.  Call us and ask us how we do it.  We do it the way I described 
above.  Both we and 9netave assign a coded login-name.  Some companies let 
users choose their own login name, so the first joe will get joe, and the 
second one won't.

If you let the customer set up his own email, you have to have them use 
aliases.  If you set it up for them you can either set up aliases, or use 
it the first way I described above.  We don't let our customers anywhere 
near siteadmin.

> Any other suggestions, folks?  How are you all accomplishing this?  And does
> it mess up the RAQ GUI?

Like most hosting customers, we like to control what customers can and 
can't do.

I'm currently working on scripts to handle forms that will allow customers 
to add/change users, set up names, etc., via the web.

We do it something like this:

Email Login Name:  c1s1m001  (meaning cobalt 1, site 1, mailbox 1)
Email address:     joe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Email password:    ********

The customer doesn't know it's an alias, and doesn't know he could also get 
mail at <c1s1m001@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, or even at <c1s1m001@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>.

--
Jeff Lasman, nobaloney.net
<jblists@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
<www.nobaloney.net>, <www.mailtraqna.com>, <www.email-lists.com>