Conceptual solution for personal email hosting and IMAP client

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Posted by George_, 04-12-2014, 08:16 AM
Hi, I have a basic homepage and various email addresses. Personal domain name deployed and hosted via a shared cpanel install. Email address are allocated for specific purposes, for example, facebook@mydomain.com, I pick up emails using an IMAP client. I need a better solution and I'm fishing for ideas and concepts. It would be ideal if I could easily set-up mailboxes in as few clicks or keystrokes as needed. This would enable me to quickly allocate mailboxes instead of using "junk" email providers. The problem is, the way I'm doing things right now, it's very laborious to login to cpanel and also set-up imap accounts in Thunderbird just for a few emails. Can you see what I'm saying? --I want to quickly create mailboxes under my domain, receive messages via IMAP, and also be able to tear down old addresses very quickly. My question is; What tech would enable me to do this very quickly and seamlessly. It wouldn't have to be automated or scripted but it should be very quick and not need so many commands. Note: I need IMAP access to receive PDFs (for example) but I don't have a fixed IP to set-up a box locally. Thanks. Last edited by George_; 04-12-2014 at 08:20 AM.
Posted by fabin, 04-12-2014, 08:24 AM
Is Google apps still in service? Not sure. You can check on zimbra too. Not sure how easy it will be easy for you.
Posted by George_, 04-12-2014, 08:32 AM
There's no way I'd use Google. re zimbra; cute but I'd like to access all mailboxes without constant log in/out. I can see that I could easily script the mailbox creation on a VPS simply using a hand-modified text file uploaded via a shell. However; It still take ages to config the IMAP account in Thunderbird what with the GUI etc. Obviously if I was running a linux client I could also script the client-end ...but I'm using Win7 locally (client) How can I make it more streamlined ? Last edited by George_; 04-12-2014 at 08:41 AM.
Posted by George_, 04-12-2014, 08:35 AM
Can someone tell me best practice for dealing with this? Obviously I'm pretty old school and like to have control over things but perhaps messing about with IMAP mailboxes is 20th century already ?? Can't the email accounts be "pushed" to the client without resorting to "webmail" ?
Posted by fabin, 04-12-2014, 08:43 AM
With latest Thunderbird, it will auto detect most of the configuration. But still you need to give the username, email address, and password of mail account.
Posted by George_, 04-12-2014, 09:11 AM
I find it's still a long drawn out process I could do without.
Posted by Squidix - SamBarrow, 04-12-2014, 10:17 AM
If ramping up and tearing down addresses is your priority, a small VPS running postfix with a shell script to create aliases forwarding to a primary account is the quickest way to go, but you won't get separate boxes in thunderbird with that. Getting thunderbird account creation automated is going to be the most problematic by far. If you're open to setting up a webmail script like roundcube, that solves that problem. No setup required, just log in with email and password.
Posted by George_, 04-12-2014, 11:10 AM
Thanks Sam. Gives me some ideas. Roundcube is pretty good nowadays it seems.
Posted by The_Dominator, 04-12-2014, 11:25 AM
this is a problem that is not unique to you but lots of people, and other issues as well for small business owners. We have been working on this cloudbusinessbox that will allow what you want and a ton more but we are long way off still. The idea is to add things and items in a few click and all from one main control panel. Exchange can do what you want, but it adds even more layers and more issues