Well, We're Almost 'Go'
Things are starting up again in my personal server wars. My CD-RW drive has just ejected the second and final disc in the FreeBSD 6.0 release. The MD5’s checked out, and we’re ready to get started as soon as I acquire a scrap HDD from Steve and my replacement motherboard from Shuttle tomorrow.
What’s the goal? To create a web, database, and e-mail server that is manageable from a near-100% web console. Set-it-and-forget-it, Ronco style. It must be grokkable for a competant, Windows power user.
The hit list for the software installs:
- PHP/Static web server: lighttpd. I’m not in love with everything Textdrive does, but this is certainly one of their shining points. Fast, anti-Apache in nearly every way. Pro-Brandar, most definitely.
- Database: MySQL. Yeah, hate all you want. I know it’s not the best. I know triggers and stored procedures are not cool enough to wait on for ten years. I know, I know, I know. PostgreSQL is better. But, it works with the stuff I need it to work with, so I’m using it. So there. If you don’t like it, buy your own server.
- E-mail MTA: Postfix. I’m not in love with everything Textdrive does, but this is certainly one of their shining points. Fast, anti-Sendmail in nearly every way. Pro-Brandar, most definitely. Yeah, it’s a repeat. No, I’m not creative. And, did I mention Postfix allows for storage of configuration in a MySQL database? Could that be my plan?
- IMAP/POP3: Dovecot. Not a whole lot of experience with this one, but it’s supposedly a cleaned-up, faster Courier. It uses Maildir, which is good. UNIX mail queues suck. It also will use Postfix-compatible MySQL databases for configuration.
- E-Mail Web Management: Postfix Admin. This looks like it rocks. We’ll see. It’s PHP, widely-used, and good.
- Spam Prevention: DSPAM. DSPAM is better than SpamAssassin, so I’m using it. It requires Apache for its CGI quarantine manager, so I’m installing Apache on port 8080 and setting up forwards from lightty. It’ll work. I promise.
So, that’s about it. Maybe some more web scripts (phpMyAdmin for MySQL, etc.), but the main functionality should be included above. We’ll see how it goes in the next month or so.