Leaving Google

I have to abandon keeping Wildsong.biz on Google Mail because over the years Google evolved the service offering from being just email to being a "suite" of tools that I don't need or want, and then finally used the "suite" as a justification for it to be a for-pay only service. All that's fair, but I am not motivated to pay for the service.

I am setting up map46.com and w6gkd.radio domains for starters to test everything.

For now,

1. Set up new gmail accounts
2. Forward from existing wildsong accounts to new gmail accounts
3. Set up email forwarder for wildsong.biz
4. Move devices (phones and tablets) to new addresses

I have a VPS at Tektonic.net as the mail server. It's on the Internet all the time even when I trip and kick the wires out of the wall here at home.

As my SMTP server I will be using Postfix, along with its friends Postgrey, SpamAssassin and ClamAV.

Checklist

Hostname "hostname -f" should show the FQDN, which is w6gkd.w6gkd.radio Set FQDN in /etc/hosts

Firewall? No. I am currently running fail2ban but have no firewall as such right now, which is fine for this server. I'd need to make sure port 25 is open.

System time. It is on UTC. Change it. Install NTP.

timedatectl set-timezone America/Los_Angeles
apt install ntp
systemctl status ntp

Syslog I think it is already set up. See /var/log/mail*

DNS is at Cloudflare. "dig w6gkd.radio MX" tells me it's pointed at the right place. The names "mail", "smtp", and "imap" should be CNAMEs fpr w6gkd.w6gkd.radio

The reverse needs a PTR record in place at the ISP. I did this via a ticket with Tektonic. It now returns w6gkd.w6gkd.radio

SMTP authentication - so I can forward mail from Google (and my own servers). https://www.bluehost.com/help/article/email-client-enable-smtp-authentication

My standard TXT record for email, V=SPF1 +A +MX -ALL

Server: mail.DOMAINNAME
Port: 465 with SSL

TLS Certificate

Install and configure Postfix

Out goes Exim4, in with Postfix. I am running all the mail services in Dockers.

apt remove exim4-base exim4-config exim4-daemon-light 
apt install postfix postgrey spamassassin clamav

The Book of Postfix

Configure in /etc/postfix especially main.cf

Filters

• Postgrey -- https://postgrey.schweikert.ch/
• Spamassassin -- https://spamassassin.apache.org/
• ClamAV -- Antivirus / malware -- https://www.clamav.net/

IMAP - Dovecot

I am inclined to install dovecot, mysql, and elastic search in Docker containers Docker based installations are so clean and flexible.

Forward mail from one gmail account to another

[email protected] -> [email protected]

Move mail from one gmail account to another

Google uses POP3 to transfer mail between accounts. Strangely Google does not allow Google to import mail from Google. In the old account you have to allow "less secure" apps and do a captcha thing. The process is not documented by Google, it's described in a community posting.

Google's process to describe transferring mail is described by a user, not by Google. Whatever.