cyrus-imapd howto

[Florin Andrei]

When it was more difficult, it worked: months ago, i compiled and
installed Cyrus-IMAPd on FC1 and had no issues with it.

Now, when it's simple, it does not work. On FC2, i can't convince Cyrus
to work. I can create the accounts, but Evo does not read the email
that's delivered.

Anyone using Cyrus on FC2? What were the steps you took to make it work,
after installing the RPM?

-- 
Florin Andrei

http://florin.myip.org/

[Alexander Dalloz]

Am Mo, den 07.06.2004 schrieb Florin Andrei um 9:45:

>  When it was more difficult, it worked: months ago, i compiled and
>  installed Cyrus-IMAPd on FC1 and had no issues with it.
>  
>  Now, when it's simple, it does not work. On FC2, i can't convince Cyrus
>  to work. I can create the accounts, but Evo does not read the email
>  that's delivered.
>  
>  Anyone using Cyrus on FC2? What were the steps you took to make it work,
>  after installing the RPM? 
>  Florin Andrei 
It is necessary to tell the MTA to use cyrus's deliver tool and to find
the LMTP socket.

You may check bugzilla for RFE entries I made in late FC2test3 time
which unfortunately did not find their way into final FC2. So all 3 MTA
shipped with FC2 (Sendmail, Postfix, Exim) are not ready to use in
combination with Cyrus-IMAPd. With some more details about your setup,
especially the MTA you are using, you may ask me again.

Alexander


-- 
Alexander Dalloz | Enger, Germany | GPG key 1024D/ED695653 1999-07-13
Fedora GNU/Linux Core 2 (Tettnang) on Athlon CPU kernel 2.6.5-1.358 
Serendipity 11:38:06 up 5 days, 11:56, load average: 0.18, 0.20, 0.17

[Florin Andrei]

On Mon, 2004-06-07 at 02:41, Alexander Dalloz wrote:
>  Am Mo, den 07.06.2004 schrieb Florin Andrei um 9:45: 
>  > Anyone using Cyrus on FC2? What were the steps you took to make
> it work,
>  > after installing the RPM? 
>  It is necessary to tell the MTA to use cyrus's deliver tool and
> to find
>  the LMTP socket. 
Yeah, i did that. I can see in the logs that Postfix tries to deliver
the mail to Cyrus. But it gets rejected with:

Jun  7 23:10:42 weiqi lmtpunix[12529]: append_check() of 'user.florin'
failed (Mailbox does not exist)
Jun  7 23:10:42 weiqi postfix/lmtp[12627]: B6C6FB4057:
to=<florin(a)weiqi.home.local>,
relay=/var/lib/imap/socket/lmtp[/var/lib/imap/socket/lmtp], delay=0,
status=bounced (host
/var/lib/imap/socket/lmtp[/var/lib/imap/socket/lmtp] said: 550-Mailbox
unknown.  Either there is no mailbox associated with this 550-name or
you do not have authorization to see it. 550 5.1.1 User unknown (in
reply to RCPT TO command))

However, the user does exist, i just created it:

weiqi.home.local> cm user.florin
weiqi.home.local> setacl user.florin florin lrswipcd
weiqi.home.local> setacl user.florin anyone none

And i can verify its existence:

weiqi.home.local> lm
user.florin (\HasNoChildren)

Funny thing is, on the other system, which works fine (FC1, same Cyrus
version, slightly older RPM version by Simon Matter compiled by myself),
lm looks a bit different:

localhost.localdomain> lm
user/florin (\HasChildren)
user/florin/Drafts (\HasNoChildren)
user/florin/Sent (\HasNoChildren)
...

The separator here being /

The only major differences between the way the two were built is that
the one that works was built with deliver-wrapper and idled enabled.
The config files in /etc are identical. cyrus.conf is stock, imapd.conf
has a few lines added by myself:

unixhierarchysep: 1
altnamespace: 1
sieve_maxscriptsize: 320

Apparently, Cyrus on FC2 does not honor "unixhierarchysep". I don't know
whether that's the cause.

-- 
Florin Andrei

http://florin.myip.org/

[Florin Andrei]

On Mon, 2004-06-07 at 23:39, Florin Andrei wrote:

>  unixhierarchysep: 1
>  altnamespace: 1
>  
>  Apparently, Cyrus on FC2 does not honor "unixhierarchysep". I don't know
>  whether that's the cause. 
It's not. I set both lines above to 0 and it still doesn't work.

-- 
Florin Andrei

http://florin.myip.org/

cyrus-imapd howto - SOLVED!

[Florin Andrei]

On Mon, 2004-06-07 at 00:45, Florin Andrei wrote:
>  When it was more difficult, it worked: months ago, i compiled and
>  installed Cyrus-IMAPd on FC1 and had no issues with it.
>  Now, when it's simple, it does not work. On FC2, i can't convince Cyrus
>  to work. I can create the accounts, but Evo does not read the email
>  that's delivered. 
Ok, i got it nailed down.

These are the steps required to make it work:

0. Fix saslauthd

Edit /etc/sysconfig/saslauthd and change MECH to "pam":

MECH=pam

Then (re)start saslauthd

1. Install the software

[root@weiqi florin]# yum install cyrus-imapd cyrus-imapd-utils

(optionally cyrus-imapd-devel)

2. Edit config files

In /etc/cyrus.conf i only commented out pop3 and pop3s, since i'm not
going to use POP3 with Cyrus.
In /etc/imapd.conf i added these lines at the end:

unixhierarchysep: 1
altnamespace: 1
sieve_maxscriptsize: 320

The first line allows for Unix-style separators (/) instead of
news-style (.). Also the folders are created a bit differently inside
the Cyrus spool.

Without the second line, all IMAP folders must be created inside Inbox
by your mail client. That's weird, so i added the second line which
allows to create new folders at the same level as Inbox.

On my other Cyrus server, I had to increase the variable on the 3rd line
(default is 32) to 320 because i have way too many folders and a lot of
Sieve filter rules, so i was hitting the limits.

Now verify there is no other IMAP server running, then start
cyrus-imapd.

3. Change password to the "cyrus" account

[root@weiqi florin]# passwd cyrus
Changing password for user cyrus.
New UNIX password:
Retype new UNIX password:
passwd: all authentication tokens updated successfully.

4. Login as "cyrus"

[root@weiqi florin]# su - cyrus
-bash-2.05b$$ whoami
cyrus
-bash-2.05b$

5. As the "cyrus" user, create accounts with the cyradm tool

Run "cyradm localhost" and provide the password of the account
"cyrus".
> From now on, you'll do a lot of things at the cyradm prompt.
-bash-2.05b$ cyradm localhost
IMAP Password: weiqi.home.local>
weiqi.home.local> cm user/florin

IMPORTANT:
This is why it failed before! I used to do "cm user.florin" which is the
default Cyrus way, and it failed. Once i did "cm user/florin" instead,
it worked.

Repeat by replacing "florin" with other account names.

All authentication will be done against the Unix user database (IMAP
password same as Unix password). That's not required by Cyrus, which can
create its own user database; in fact, one could run a Cyrus server with
no Unix accounts, just accounts in the Cyrus db; but for that, the auth
must be changed from the default.
Just for testing purposes, Unix auth is fine.

Verify the account creation:

weiqi.home.local> lm
user/florin (\HasNoChildren)

Set permissive ACLs for that account (see "man cyradm" for details):

weiqi.home.local> setacl user/florin florin lrswipcd

See ACLs that you just set:

weiqi.home.local> lam user/florin
florin lrswipcd

On a production server you might need to restrict those ACLs. The ACL i
indicated is almost (but not quite) equal to administrator privileges on
that account.

6. Configure Postfix to deliver to Cyrus instead of delivering to
/var/spool/mail

Edit /etc/postfix/main.cf, look for the section containing
mailbox_transport and add this line:

mailbox_transport = lmtp:unix:/var/lib/imap/socket/lmtp

If this is your "production" server, then just for the duration of the
tests comment out "inet_interfaces = all" and uncomment "inet_interfaces
= localhost" so that mail coming in from outside is not delivered to
your unborn-yet maybe-still-buggy Cyrus server.
Restart Postfix.

7. Test

[root@weiqi root]# echo test | mail -s test florin@localhost

Watch the logs to see if it gets delivered properly.
This is where it used to fail for me before. It kept on saying there's
no such account ("550-Mailbox unknown"). Once i created the account with
"/" instead of ".", the delivery succeeded.

Go to /var/spool/imap and poke around and see if you can find the mail
files. Cyrus stores each message in its own file, try and find them.

Now hook-up an IMAP client to your server and see if you can access the
mail. Try it out, create directories, move messages around, etc.

8. Go live

Once all is ok, replace "inet_interfaces = localhost" with
"inet_interfaces = all" then restart Postfix.

9. Future development

One of the strengths of Cyrus is server-side filtering: you can tell it
to filter email in folders regardless of the email client: sorting is
performed by the server, not by the client.
This is accomplished via Sieve. Install Horde/Ingo or another Sieve
manager and create your own rules.

Another trick:
Create shared folders among users, either for collaboration or for other
purposes (big unique spam trashcans that get polled by scripts feeding
spam into SpamAssassin/sa-learn).

That's it.

-- 
Florin Andrei

http://florin.myip.org/

cyrus-imapd howto - SOLVED!

[Florin Andrei]

On Tue, 2004-06-08 at 00:58, Florin Andrei wrote:

>  5. As the "cyrus" user, create accounts with the cyradm
> tool
>  
>  Run "cyradm localhost" and provide the password of the account
> "cyrus".
>  >From now on, you'll do a lot of things at the cyradm prompt.
>  
>  -bash-2.05b$ cyradm localhost
>  IMAP Password: weiqi.home.local>
>  weiqi.home.local> cm user/florin 
Just to make it clear, with Cyrus you have to explicitly create with
cyradm each account that receives mail. If you just create the Unix
account, it will not receive mail!

That's because Cyrus does not care about the Unix user database, it uses
its own. It's just an artifact of the default setup with FC2 that
authentication is performed against the Unix user database, Cyrus can be
(and usually is) totally independent of it.

-- 
Florin Andrei

http://florin.myip.org/

cyrus-imapd howto - SOLVED!

[Alexander Dalloz]

Am Di, den 08.06.2004 schrieb Florin Andrei um 10:20:

>  Just to make it clear, with Cyrus you have to explicitly create with
>  cyradm each account that receives mail. If you just create the Unix
>  account, it will not receive mail! 
Partly true. Based on the packaging by Simon Matter the Cyrus-IMAPd on
FC2 has the autocreate patch, see

http://email.uoa.gr/projects/cyrus/autocreate/

Thus - if you configure it proper - INBOXes can be created
automagically.

>  That's because Cyrus does not care about the Unix user database,
> it uses
>  its own. It's just an artifact of the default setup with FC2 that
>  authentication is performed against the Unix user database, Cyrus can be
>  (and usually is) totally independent of it. 
Right, though I would not call it artifact. It is like with the MTA,
which you can too configure to authenticate against a system independent
user database (i.e. sasldb, ldap, mysql).

>  Florin Andrei 
Btw. thanks for your effort to explain new Cyrus-IMAPd users some
important features and configuration steps in the other list mailing.

The only thing which I do not understand is, why you said following:

0. Fix saslauthd

Edit /etc/sysconfig/saslauthd and change MECH to "pam":

MECH=pam

Then (re)start saslauthd

Is that really a needed step? If yes, then saslauthd became broken as it
worked withouth problems on FC1. Can you confirm that MECH=shadow does
not work?! Would be worth a bugzilla entry then.

Regards

Alexander


-- 
Alexander Dalloz | Enger, Germany | GPG key 1024D/ED695653 1999-07-13
Fedora GNU/Linux Core 2 (Tettnang) on Athlon CPU kernel 2.6.5-1.358 
Serendipity 15:04:27 up 6 days, 15:22, load average: 0.17, 0.25, 0.22

cyrus-imapd howto - SOLVED!

[Ow Mun Heng]

On Tue, 2004-06-08 at 21:13, Alexander Dalloz wrote:
>  Am Di, den 08.06.2004 schrieb Florin Andrei um 10:20:
>  
>  > Just to make it clear, with Cyrus you have to explicitly create with
>  > cyradm each account that receives mail. If you just create the Unix
>  > account, it will not receive mail!
>  
>  Partly true. Based on the packaging by Simon Matter the Cyrus-IMAPd on
>  FC2 has the autocreate patch, see
>  
>  http://email.uoa.gr/projects/cyrus/autocreate/
>  
>  Thus - if you configure it proper - INBOXes can be created
>  automagically. 
I've read about it and I've read the doc sources in FC3, it does list 
this as something which is already there. Does there need to be a 
special flag to tell it to autocreate??


-- 
Ow Mun Heng
Gentoo/Linux on DELL D600 1.4Ghz 
98% Microsoft(tm) Free!! 
Neuromancer 15:19:17 up 31 min, 6 
users, load average: 0.14, 0.23,

cyrus-imapd howto - SOLVED!

[Alexander Dalloz]

Am Mo, den 27.12.2004 schrieb Ow Mun Heng um 8:20:

>  > Partly true. Based on the packaging by Simon Matter the
> Cyrus-IMAPd on
>  > FC2 has the autocreate patch, see
>  > 
>  > http://email.uoa.gr/projects/cyrus/autocreate/
>  > 
>  > Thus - if you configure it proper - INBOXes can be created
>  > automagically.
>  
>  I've read about it and I've read the doc sources in FC3, it does list 
>  this as something which is already there. Does there need to be a 
>  special flag to tell it to autocreate?? 
Of course.

>  Ow Mun Heng 
Above site does explain the switches. In the "Installation instructions"
section you find all information:

Check the following options of the imapd.conf file. 
createonpost :  It must be "yes" in order to activate patch operations,
when an incoming message arrives (LMTP). (default = no)
[...]

Alexander


-- 
Alexander Dalloz | Enger, Germany | new address - new key: 0xB366A773
legal statement: http://www.uni-x.org/legal.html
Fedora GNU/Linux Core 2 (Tettnang) on Athlon kernel 2.6.9-1.6_FC2smp 
Serendipity 11:58:50 up 4 days, 13:42, load average: 0.15, 0.24, 0.23

cyrus-imapd howto - SOLVED!

[Ow Mun Heng]

On Mon, 2004-12-27 at 19:02, Alexander Dalloz wrote:
>  Am Mo, den 27.12.2004 schrieb Ow Mun Heng um 8:20:
>  
>  > > Partly true. Based on the packaging by Simon Matter the Cyrus-IMAPd on
>  > > FC2 has the autocreate patch, see
>  > > 
>  > > http://email.uoa.gr/projects/cyrus/autocreate/
>  > > 
>  > > Thus - if you configure it proper - INBOXes can be created
>  > > automagically.
>  > 
>  > I've read about it and I've read the doc sources in FC3, it does list 
>  > this as something which is already there. Does there need to be a 
>  > special flag to tell it to autocreate??
>  
>  Of course. 
Naturally eh..

>  
>  Above site does explain the switches. In the "Installation instructions"
>  section you find all information:
>  
>  Check the following options of the imapd.conf file. 
>  createonpost :  It must be "yes" in order to activate patch operations,
>  when an incoming message arrives (LMTP). (default = no) 

Thanks.
Funny I can't seem to be able to locate a site which actually lists down
all the options which I can put into imapd.conf file. (I believe there
is onem but I've not  found it yet!)

>  Alexander 
-- 
Ow Mun Heng
Gentoo/Linux on DELL D600 1.4Ghz 
98% Microsoft(tm) Free!! 
Neuromancer 20:14:28 up 5:26, 5 users, 
load average: 2.72, 2.94, 2.90

cyrus-imapd howto - SOLVED!

[Alexander Dalloz]

Am Mo, den 27.12.2004 schrieb Ow Mun Heng um 13:15:

>  > Above site does explain the switches. In the "Installation
> instructions"
>  > section you find all information:
>  > 
>  > Check the following options of the imapd.conf file. 
>  > createonpost :  It must be "yes" in order to activate patch operations,
>  > when an incoming message arrives (LMTP). (default = no)
>  
>  
>  Thanks.
>  Funny I can't seem to be able to locate a site which actually lists down
>  all the options which I can put into imapd.conf file. (I believe there
>  is onem but I've not  found it yet!) 
This is some sort of self critics? :)

Just to be sure, the site I refer to is

http://email.uoa.gr/projects/cyrus/autocreate/

and it lists the options for the imapd.conf file to activate the
autocreate patch options.
 
>  Ow Mun Heng 
Alexander


-- 
Alexander Dalloz | Enger, Germany | new address - new key: 0xB366A773
legal statement: http://www.uni-x.org/legal.html
Fedora GNU/Linux Core 2 (Tettnang) on Athlon kernel 2.6.9-1.6_FC2smp 
Serendipity 13:26:20 up 4 days, 15:10, load average: 0.36, 0.24, 0.23

cyrus-imapd howto - SOLVED!

[Ow Mun Heng]

On Mon, 2004-12-27 at 20:28, Alexander Dalloz wrote:
>  Am Mo, den 27.12.2004 schrieb Ow Mun Heng um 13:15:
>  
>  > > createonpost :  It must be "yes" in order to activate patch
> operations,
>  > > when an incoming message arrives (LMTP). (default = no)
>  >  
>  > Funny I can't seem to be able to locate a site which
> actually lists down
>  > all the options which I can put into imapd.conf file. (I believe there
>  > is onem but I've not  found it yet!)
>  
>  This is some sort of self critics? :) 
I'm my own worst critic.


>  Just to be sure, the site I refer to is
>  
>  http://email.uoa.gr/projects/cyrus/autocreate/
>  
>  and it lists the options for the imapd.conf file to activate the
>  autocreate patch options. 
Actually, I wasn't referring to the auto create
patch. I was refering
more towards being unable to locate a site which shows the 101 options
which I'm sure cyrus has for populating into imapd.conf.


-- 
Ow Mun Heng
Gentoo/Linux on DELL D600 1.4Ghz 
98% Microsoft(tm) Free!! 
Neuromancer 10:29:49 up 1:17, 8 users, 
load average: 1.62, 1.36, 1.72

cyrus-imapd howto - SOLVED!

[Alexander Dalloz]

Am Di, den 28.12.2004 schrieb Ow Mun Heng um 3:31:

>  > Just to be sure, the site I refer to is
>  > 
>  > http://email.uoa.gr/projects/cyrus/autocreate/
>  > 
>  > and it lists the options for the imapd.conf file to activate the
>  > autocreate patch options.
>  Actually, I wasn't referring to the auto create patch. I was refering
>  more towards being unable to locate a site which shows the 101 options
>  which I'm sure cyrus has for populating into imapd.conf. 
O, I see. Maybe it is too obvious, but using "man imapd.conf" will
explain you all the bells and whistles.
 
>  Ow Mun Heng 
Alexander


-- 
Alexander Dalloz | Enger, Germany | new address - new key: 0xB366A773
legal statement: http://www.uni-x.org/legal.html
Fedora GNU/Linux Core 2 (Tettnang) on Athlon kernel 2.6.9-1.6_FC2smp 
Serendipity 11:17:22 up 5 days, 13:01, load average: 0.72, 0.52, 0.31

cyrus-imapd howto - SOLVED!

[Ow Mun Heng]

On Tue, 2004-12-28 at 18:18, Alexander Dalloz wrote:
>  Am Di, den 28.12.2004 schrieb Ow Mun Heng um 3:31:
>  
>  > > Just to be sure, the site I refer to is
>  > > 
>  > > http://email.uoa.gr/projects/cyrus/autocreate/
>  > > 
>  > > and it lists the options for the imapd.conf file to activate the
>  > > autocreate patch options.
>  > Actually, I wasn't referring to the auto create patch. I was refering
>  > more towards being unable to locate a site which shows the 101 options
>  > which I'm sure cyrus has for populating into imapd.conf.
>  
>  O, I see. Maybe it is too obvious, but using "man imapd.conf" will
>  explain you all the bells and whistles. 
DUH!!! I'm going to go into that little corner there..
>   
>  > Ow Mun Heng
>  
>  Alexander 
-- 
Ow Mun Heng
Gentoo/Linux on DELL D600 1.4Ghz 
98% Microsoft(tm) Free!! 
Neuromancer 18:45:47 up 55 min, 5 
users, load average: 0.58, 0.62,

cyrus-imapd howto - SOLVED!

[Aleksandar Milivojevic]

Alexander Dalloz wrote:
>  Above site does explain the switches. In the "Installation
> instructions"
>  section you find all information:
>  
>  Check the following options of the imapd.conf file. 
>  createonpost :  It must be "yes" in order to activate patch operations,
>  when an incoming message arrives (LMTP). (default = no)
>  [...] 
You also need to tell sendmail to first check if the user exists 
(default option for cyrus* mailers is not to check).  Or you will get 
new mailbox created for each and every mistyped and/or nonexistant email 
address.

-- 
Aleksandar Milivojevic <amilivojevic(a)pbl.ca&gt;    Pollard Banknote Limited
Systems Administrator                           1499 Buffalo Place
Tel: [phone] ext 276                     Winnipeg, MB  R3T 1L7