Go Away!

This section is for seriously unhinged people, or people with some need that can't be neatly handled. If you can, simply set your systems up so that they communicate with your ISP's mail server for POP and SMTP. You'll thank me for this advice. You really will.

You're still reading? OK, the reason for setting this up is that it gives you great control over how mail flows in and out of your system. In particular, it allows you to run alias lists without too much pain and catch mail going to yourself before it goes out into the big wide world. It also allows you to download mail from a single mailbox on your ISP and distribute it to several internal mailboxes or aliases. The reasons, and there are many, for not doing this are:

• You will have to download and set up several new packages.

• You will need to develop a good knowledge of sendmail configuration files.

• You will be tied into receiving mail a fixed times, rather than checking whenever you feel like it; this is not strictly true, but it is for all intents and purposes.

• You will have several administrative headaches, particularly whenever mail is rejected and gets stuck in your mail queue.

• If you are planning to set all this up to use majordomo, you are going to have a really rotten time; I think it's possible, but I retired from the fray in confusion.