Qmail Project On Hiatus

After spending most of my time this weekend finally getting Qmail (along with all of it's Toaster friends) running on Mac OS X Server 10.2.6, I am putting the project on hiatus until Mac OS X Tiger Server comes out.

I have extensive notes on how to get the install done (get'er done!), but won't be posting those since it is fine tuned for my setup, not anyone else's. I burned down my server umpteen times trying to get this thing to finally work. Thank goodness for Carbon Copy Cloner. I restored my system back to "new" about 8 or 9 times. Most of it was due to the fact that the qmail toaster components require newer software than what ships with the default OS X Server 10.2 package. Perl was the biggest offender. I compiled it manually, and used the Aaron Faby version. Neither one turned out right.

Then there is also the question of security and stability. I will need to do further testing in regards to both aspects. Almost anything you read on the net says to NOT run Qmail SMTP and POP3 services through Xinetd. Mac OS X doesn't really have the /etc/rc.d and /etc/init.d directory structure that these programs are looking for. I had better luck running them through Xinetd than adding scripts to /System/Library/StartupItems (which can add the scripts to the end of the /etc/rc.common file). All materials found online suggest running these services through tcpserver and let those services be monitored by daemontools. I used neither.

I will see if these things work more in harmony under Tiger Server. But for now, Qmail here at the ranch will continue running on Yellow Dog Linux

The install under Linux is almost a breeze now, since everything works as it's supposed to. Too funny!

</marcus>