Email Delivery on a network

[siouxfire]

I have a network of PCs and one PC receives email on Outlook Express. Email comes into address [email protected], [email protected], etc. on this PC. How can I set up other machines to use Outlook and receive THEIR emails from this central PC?

[lisaj]

You need either to route IP traffic out onto the Internet so that each user can connect directly to your ISP's mail server and download their mail from there, or you need to install a mail server internally that will get all mail and then your users will connect to that. I suggest the former might be your best bet.

[j2buttonsw]

The trouble with the first suggestion is that each individual user may collect [email protected] so the first one on gets all the mail. With the second suggestion, the "server" collects [email protected] then distributes it into mailboxes. Each individual user picks up the mail from their mailbox only. Microsoft Exchange does this (very expensively) but there are cheaper alternatives such as RedRock. Does Linux have a free mail server?

[lisaj]

j2: QPopper and sendmail happily control mail for the majority of the planet, on Linux and many other operating systems. But what's wrong with the first option? Most ISPs offer mail aliases with POP usernames along the lines of domainname+aliasname... ie. answerbank+alice and answerbank+bob. I was thinking different machines would access the mailboxes of different aliases, not that all machines would access the same mailbox!!

[j2buttonsw]

lisaj, I agree! If the ISP will allow POP3 pickup of individual mailboxes of website.com then you are laughing: you just have to setup the POP3 user details on each person's machine. It is just that from bitter experience we have found some ISPs have only one mailbox for the domain name so POP3 pickup results in downloading [email protected] mail. Thus you need Exchange (or equivalent) to sort into user mailboxes. I suppose you could also argue that since Exchange server holds the mail it is easier to backup than from .pst files on client computers. And we all know how precious customers get about their email!

[lisaj]

Seriously though, if someone's asking this question on The Answerbank, are they really likely to install, configure and maintain Exchange?!?! Siouxfire, if your ISP is really useless, ask and I'll host your email like it should be done. Better yet, tell me who they are...

[j2buttonsw]

Try this as a free email server, it is supposed to be ideal for small workgroups and home setups: http://www.stalker.com/CommuniGatePro/#Current

[siouxfire]

lisaj: Thanks. You got it in the first attempt. I wasn't looking to spending the money on software for functionality that I wouldn't need or use. Thanks. You saved me a bundle!

[scissorman]

My heart bleeds for you j2: all that effort and no thanks, some people just don't deserve help. I have a question: If you recieved all mail via OE, what username/password did you use to download bob/jon/[email protected]? If it was the same then you will download [email protected] as j2 infered. How then can you differentiate users within this domain? And while I'm at it, j2 pointed you to a free mail server program which will sort your problem, so don't boo about spending money on software!