CentOS Linux Server Guide

CentOS Mail Server

POP/ IMAP Setting (Dovecot)

 

In order to let your user to download email to their local machine. You must install either POP or IMAP setting at your CentOS Linux Mail Server. Dovecot is one of the well-known the imap/pop server for CentOS Linux Mail system, it support for maildir and mbox format.

 

Package to be installed at your CentOS Linux Mail Server - dovecot.version.rpm

 

Install and Configure Dovecot

 

First, check if dovecot package already installed
rpm -qa dovecot

 

Else, you can istall Dovecot via Internet (using "yum command")
yum -y install dovecot

 

Or, you can istall the Dovecot package via CentOS DVD installation media

rpm -iUvh dovecot-1.0.7-7.el5.i386.rpm
warning: dovecot-1.0.7-7.el5.i386.rpm: Header V3 DSA signature: NOKEY, key ID e8562897
error: Failed dependencies:
libmysqlclient.so.15 is needed by dovecot-1.0.7-7.el5.i386
libmysqlclient.so.15(libmysqlclient_15) is needed by dovecot-1.0.7-7.el5.i386

 

If you see the libmysqlclient.so.15 is needed, you probably has not install mysql 5 yet (mysql-5.0.45-7.el5.i386.rpm), please install mysql 5 rpm package.

rpm -iUvh mysql-5.0.45-7.el5.i386.rpm
warning: mysql-5.0.45-7.el5.i386.rpm: Header V3 DSA signature: NOKEY, key ID e8562897
Preparing... ########################################### [100%]
1:mysql ########################################### [100%]

 

Now all the dependencies should be installed , we are now proceed with installing Dovecot package.

rpm -iUvh dovecot-1.0.7-7.el5.i386.rpm
warning: dovecot-1.0.7-7.el5.i386.rpm: Header V3 DSA signature: NOKEY, key ID e8562897
Preparing... ########################################### [100%]
1:dovecot ########################################### [100%

rpm -qi dovecot
Name : dovecot Relocations: (not relocatable)
Version : 1.0.7 Vendor: CentOS
Release : 7.el5 Build Date: Wed 21 Jan 2009 03:25:29 AM EST
Install Date: Sun 06 Dec 2009 11:43:39 AM EST Build Host: builder16.centos.org
Group : System Environment/Daemons Source RPM: dovecot-1.0.7-7.el5.src.rpm
Size : 3730377 License: LGPL
Signature : DSA/SHA1, Sun 08 Mar 2009 09:45:25 PM EDT, Key ID a8a447dce8562897
URL : http://www.dovecot.org/
Summary : Dovecot Secure imap server
Description :
Dovecot is an IMAP server for Linux/UNIX-like systems, written with security
primarily in mind. It also contains a small POP3 server. It supports mail
in either of maildir or mbox formats.
 

 

As you can see from the package information above, Dovecot supports IMAP and POP by default. However, you need to enable POP3 in Dovecot configuration file.

 

Configuration file location of Dovecot is stored at /etc/dovecot.conf. What we just need to alter 2 lines of code to get POP3 to work.

vim /etc/dovecot.conf

# Protocols we want to be serving: imap imaps pop3 pop3s
# If you only want to use dovecot-auth, you can set this to "none".
protocols = imap imaps pop3 pop3s
 

Delete # in front of protocols line to enable imap imaps pop3 and pop3 services.

 

Now, let start the dovecot service

service dovecot status
dovecot is stopped


service dovecot start
Starting Dovecot Imap: [ OK ]

 

Remember to enable dovecot services started automatically at Level3, 4 and 5

chkconfig --list dovecot
dovecot 0:off 1:off 2:off 3:off 4:off 5:off 6:off

chkconfig dovecot on

chkconfig --list dovecot
dovecot 0:off 1:off 2:on 3:on 4:on 5:on 6:off

 

 

Test your Dovecot services

 

There are few methods you can check the status Dovecot services.

 

1. Using telnet to check pn port 110(POP3) and 143(IMAP)

telnet 127.0.0.1 110
Trying 127.0.0.1...
Connected to mail.1a-centosserver.com (127.0.0.1).
Escape character is '^]'.
+OK Dovecot ready.
quit
+OK Logging out
Connection closed by foreign host.


telnet 127.0.0.1 143
Trying 127.0.0.1...
Connected to mail.1a-centosserver.com (127.0.0.1).
Escape character is '^]'.
* OK Dovecot ready.
 

 

2.using "ps aux | grep dovecot" command will give status of dovecot daemon

ps aux | grep dovecot
root 10322 0.0 0.0 1868 576 ? Ss 12:17 0:00 /usr/sbin/dovecot
root 10323 0.0 0.2 7692 1864 ? S 12:17 0:00 dovecot-auth
dovecot 10325 0.0 0.2 4884 1744 ? S 12:17 0:00 pop3-login
dovecot 10326 0.0 0.2 4884 1744 ? S 12:17 0:00 pop3-login
dovecot 10328 0.0 0.2 4888 1748 ? S 12:17 0:00 imap-login
dovecot 10330 0.0 0.2 4888 1752 ? S 12:17 0:00 imap-login
dovecot 10332 0.0 0.2 4884 1740 ? S 12:17 0:00 pop3-login
dovecot 10338 0.0 0.2 4888 1752 ? S 12:19 0:00 imap-login
root 10347 0.0 0.0 3912 672 pts/3 R+ 12:23 0:00 grep dovecot

 

 

You are now ready! Use your favorite mail clients agent like MS Outlook, Outlook Express, Thunderbird to connect to our Dovecot server.

 

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