Using Postfix as Mail Relay

So, postfix is a fairly full-featured, backend mailserver software, that, to be honest, the reason I’m using it is because the most recent, up to date how-to’s all use postfix. Which, I’m assuming that means its probably one of the easier mail systems to configure.

But, we will be using it to forward all of the system emails to our personal email address. I use gmail, so my examples will be more geared towards gmails smtp address and port.

This was lifted - quite almost literally - from HowToForge. [POSTFIX-HowTo]

Install Postfix

sudo apt-get install postfix mailutils

Now, during this installation, the system will prompt you with Configuration Option’s. Since we will be using an outside service to send our mail - aka smtp.gmail.com - we will select Internet Site.

If we were to use postfix in other ways, we’d pick another option.

Then, it will continue on with System Mail Name, which, technically you would normally want a FQDN address listed here. But, using your systems basic hostname is also fine, especially if you have just a couple of machines.

Configure Postfix

We will be setting the system to process emails only from “the server on which it is running,” aka the localhost or loopback interface. That way, when postfix “receives” an email from the system - for say, root - it will use Postfix to forward the email off through our specified smtp server. Thus, using the loopback as the “catch-all” for the emails.

Generic File

You’ll want to create a generic file inside of the postfix configuration directory. This should contain your systems hostname and then your email address, aka:

ubuntu-server   admin@jpcdi.com

Password File

First, we’re going to make a seperate, locked down password file that Postfix will use to authenticate with gmail.

sudo nano /etc/postfix/sasl_passwd

And add the line:

smtp.gmail.com:587  username@gmail.com:password

Which, of course, if you use a different mail service, input their info and it should work just the same. And, also, username@gmail.com:password needs to be replaced with your info.

Now, lock that file down so only root can view it.

sudo chmod 600 /etc/postfix/sasl_passwd
sudo chown root:root /etc/postfix/sasl_passwd

Process Password and Generic File

Remember when you installed mailutils? That was for postmap, which compiles and hashes the contents of our sasl_passwd and generic files, and creates a new file in the same spot, with .db added to the end, making it a database file easier to parse as it runs.

sudo postmap /etc/postfix/sasl_passwd
sudo postmap /etc/postfix/generic

Main Configure File

In the main.cf file, there are 6 specific parameters we will be using for the relay setup:

1. relayhost which specifies the mail relay host and port number. The host name will be enclosed in brackets to specify that no MX lookup is required.

2. smtp_use_tls which enables (or disables) transport layer security.

3. smtp_sasl_auth_enable which enables (or disables) SASL authentication.

4. smtp_sasl_security_options which in the following configuration will be set to empty, to ensure that no Gmail-incompatible security options are used.

5. smtp_sasl_password_maps which specifies the password file to use. This file will be compiled and hashed by postmap in a later step.

6. smtp_tls_CAfile which specifies the list of certificate authorities to use when verifying server identity.

7. smtp_generic_maps tells postfix to read your system name and email address from your generic file

sudo nano /etc/postfix/main.cf

The main.cf is postfix’s config file.

You will most likely have to add most of the above options, possibly deleting one or two in order to clump them all together in one, single block of text.

relayhost = smtp.gmail.com:587
smtp_use_tls = yes
smtp_sasl_auth_enable = yes
smtp_sasl_security_options =
smtp_sasl_password_maps = hash:/etc/postfix/sasl_passwd
smtp_tls_CAfile = /etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt
smtp_generic_maps = hash:/etc/postfix/generic

The smtp_sasl_security_options is left empty.

Restart Postfix

Restart postfix, enabling our various changes:

sudo systemctl restart postfix.service

– or –

sudo service postfix restart

Send Test Emails

This is testing if the actual forwarding part works, as you’re able to send emails through the command line.

To send a test email over the command line:

echo "This is the body of the email" | mail -s "This is the subject line" user@example.com

Making sure to put your email address in place of user@example.com. You should receive the email within a few seconds if its successful.

[POSTFIX-HowTo]

Copied very liberally from HowToForge Postfix How-To