SUNScholar/Prepare Ubuntu/S07

 NEXT - STEP 8

Step 7. Install the Postfix mail server

DSpace needs to send emails in order to facilitate submission workflows etc.

Local Server Postfix Installation

First we purge any old email system that may exist.

sudo dpkg --purge exim4

Step 7.1: Install the software

When asked for type of setup, select "Internet with smarthost". See links below for more detail before continuing.

• http://help.comodo.com/topic-157-1-288-4540-configuring-postfix-to-use-a-smarthost.html
• http://www.dnsexit.com/support/mailrelay/postfix.html
• http://gopalthorve.com/install-postfix-mta-and-configure-smarthost

Install the postfix mail server as follows:

sudo apt-get install postfix

Step 7.3: Setup default mailname

Now we edit the servers "mailname" by typing as follows:

sudo nano /etc/mailname

Add one line only which should be the hostname (URL) of your server.

Now we restart Postfix by typing as follows:

sudo service postfix restart

Step 7.4: Setup the email aliases

Now we need to forward any email sent to local accounts on the server to email accounts of persons responsible for the repository.

The "root" and "dspace user" email address forwarding are setup as follows.

Type the following.

sudo nano /etc/aliases

Add aliases as per example below:

# Added by installer for initial user
root:   me@my.edu.ac.za
dspace: me@my.edu.ac.za

Change the me@my.edu.ac.za to your email address.

To activate the new aliases type the following:

sudo newaliases

Step 7.5: Send a test email to root

Install the command line mailer program as follows:

sudo apt-get install mailutils

Now we can send a test email to the root user by typing as follows:

mail -s "Test Email from root" root

Press the "Enter" key and type some message content. Press CTL+D twice and then Enter to send the mail.

Check the following log for any delivery errors as follows:

sudo tail -n 20 /var/log/mail.log

If there are no delivery errors then your mail server is setup.

Well done.

Sender Email Gateway Choices

You can use any email server to facilitate email messaging, however if your campus does not have an email server then you can use gmail as an email gateway. See below for more details.

Using offsite Gmail server gateway

If you do not have a campus email server to use, then try using GMail as your email gateway server. See the link below for instructions.

http://blog.stuartlewis.com/2009/09/05/using-gmail-with-dspace

Please note: For this to work, you will have to make sure the local repository server has unrestricted access to the GMail server via your campus firewall and that all the relevant ports are open on your local server.

Gmail Help

• https://support.google.com/mail/answer/78775?hl=en

Using onsite campus email server gateway

Using the campus email server we setup "Postfix" as a "smarthost" which uses the campus email server as the actual MTA (mail transfer agent) to relay email.

See local Postfix installation steps below for instructions.

Also see: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Postfix for further help.

References

• http://www.smtp2go.com/docs/postfix
• http://www.tecmint.com/setting-up-email-services-smtp-and-restricting-access-to-smtp
• http://www.tecmint.com/setup-postfix-mail-server-in-ubuntu-debian
• https://www.linux.com/learn/how-install-and-test-postfix-mail-server
• https://easyengine.io/tutorials/mail/postfix-debugging
• http://manage.jujucharms.com/charms/precise/postfix
• http://xmodulo.com/2014/01/how-mail-server-works.html
• http://blog.stuartlewis.com/2009/09/05/using-gmail-with-dspace
• https://roundcube.net
• http://wiki.lib.sun.ac.za/index.php/SUNScholar/Install_DSpace/S09

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Below is a screenshot of the yearly postifx mail queue

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