Gmail alternative: good idea to use personal domain+hosting?
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Hi. I used to run a mail server around ten years ago and started running it again last year.
I have three receive mail domains and one mail domain that does both. It is /so/ much harder now.
- One domain that I let lapse for a few years is currently being impersonated by various servers.
- There are periodic and frequent attempts to login via compromised credentials
- Domain and IP reputation is a thing now.
The first challenge is to find a server that will let you host email but that isn’t on a spam list. Some spam lists you can apply to get off, some you can’t.
Then you have Microsoft. With Google you get thrown into spam. With Microsoft, your email just doesn’t make it. Their support is non existent.
I switched servers three times and took another month to get to Microsoft hosted inboxes. And your email is useless without Microsoft due to all the businesses that use Microsoft as a mail provider
And then if you use the mail app on iOS you quickly discover that you have to manually refresh because just on iOS, the mail app doesn’t support imap push or whatever it’s called.
I still haven’t found a good SELF hosted solution. There are third parties you can use but I don’t want to do it. There used to be a few popular solutions but development went off and on so some distros dropped it.
I’m still on Google and Apple calendar because I haven’t found a solution for that.
Of course there are solutions that encompass it all, but I am running postfix and dovecot and finally got it stable so I’m not running mailcow or whatever…
Nextcloud is great for contacts and calendar. Try it. I recommend using the all-in-one docker. Super easy to setup.
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I've been using my own cloud-hosted SMTP relay and Zimbra server for over a decade now, and I love it.
There can be a bit of a learning curve, and in some cases sites won't accept mail from cloud-hosted domains. I add those domains to a rule in sendmail that sends those domains through Amazon SES, and then they get accepted.
If you do go this route, just make sure that your recovery emails or 2FA for things like your registrar go somewhere else. If your cloud provider pulls the plug on you or something you don't want to be stuck waiting for an email that can't arrive.
I love the level of control that I have over my email and wouldn't have it any other way.
tl;dr: steep learning curve, but worth it in the long run. Keep gmail as a recovery/2FA account or something, though.
What benefits do you get from selfhosting?
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You can point your domain on any hoster like mailbox.org. There are a lot of benefits at not hosting your own mailserver.
A major downside is that email is not encrypted and Email usually contains very sensitive personal information.
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But why support the Nazi sympathizer?
Where did you dig this up?
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I can read his tweet. It makes absolutely no sense as his words are the literal opposite of what is really happening right in front of everyone's eyes. The only explanation is he is sucking up to the party that is dismantling our democracy for his own financial gain.
He stands to gain nothing from this. This is a swizz company.
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I can read his tweet. It makes absolutely no sense as his words are the literal opposite of what is really happening right in front of everyone's eyes. The only explanation is he is sucking up to the party that is dismantling our democracy for his own financial gain.
The other user already shared some article with lots of historical data, both words and actions, that should give a better picture.
Anyway, since you decided to ignore all that, then there is also to say that the tweet was a speculation made months ago on a topic where nothing happened yet (or at least, I haven't read any news about antitrust in the last month).
I don't think anything will happen, but anyway that makes it at most naive. -
I've read this with concerning frequency, was SPF/DMARC/DKIM all in order? I also have to question if it was a matter of IP reputation, since shared hosting IP ranges are usually pretty thrashed.
I rent mailbox services (for a custom domain) from a local ISP and don't have problems with deliverability as such.
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I've read this with concerning frequency, was SPF/DMARC/DKIM all in order? I also have to question if it was a matter of IP reputation, since shared hosting IP ranges are usually pretty thrashed.
I rent mailbox services (for a custom domain) from a local ISP and don't have problems with deliverability as such.
Those were in order (it was 15 years ago so i don't recall if all existed but at least some did). Probably ip range but who knows
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Wait, is everyone using the same account or something? Why don't they just use whatever email account they already use?
Proton just sends and accepts regular, unencrypted email, which is totally fine for something like a casual game. Whether you use Proton or something else is irrelevant, all that matters is that your end works.
I’m not the only user of my domain, I have other users.
I don’t want to use Google.
My use case unfortunately meant proton and Tutanoa did not work.
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Yeah,but please don't use Proton unless you are aware of their drawbacks and marketing lies.
(I am not counting the tweet here...)Or go through my post history,I have explained multiple times here why proton is not an ideal choice.
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I know there are alternatives like proton mail, tutamail, mailbox.org, etc... But what would be the issue if I create an email using my personal domain, stored in my hosting.. maybe encryption? It seems that no-one even consider this option, but I am not sure why...
What would you suggest?
I'm basic. Been using namecheap+privateemail for years and no complaints. Mostly through the clients Thunderbird on desktop of FairMail on mobile.
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Rolling your own email is a pain. That said, I use a VPS and host my own server with domain name and site for $5/month. Setting it up was a pain, but once you get all the records right so you're not considered spam, it works really well. That said, I haven't done anything with webmail; I strictly use IMAP and SMTP.
I agree!
Setup felt like a nightmare but once everything is up and running it's fine.
The other issue is maintenance which is where I gave up. Easier and more painless to just pay another company to do that and not have to worry about server security, spam, the endless SSH requests for 'admin', etc etc
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I agree!
Setup felt like a nightmare but once everything is up and running it's fine.
The other issue is maintenance which is where I gave up. Easier and more painless to just pay another company to do that and not have to worry about server security, spam, the endless SSH requests for 'admin', etc etc
Easier and more painless to just pay another company to do that and not have to worry about server security, spam, the endless SSH requests for ‘admin’, etc etc
Definitely. I do it for fun though. I'm kind of a masochist
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I know there are alternatives like proton mail, tutamail, mailbox.org, etc... But what would be the issue if I create an email using my personal domain, stored in my hosting.. maybe encryption? It seems that no-one even consider this option, but I am not sure why...
What would you suggest?
I've been using my own domain pointed at Inbox.eu. They're based in the EU and I haven't had any problems, I pay for 2 users, the price is something like 12€ per user per year, so it's cheap enough for me.
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I know there are alternatives like proton mail, tutamail, mailbox.org, etc... But what would be the issue if I create an email using my personal domain, stored in my hosting.. maybe encryption? It seems that no-one even consider this option, but I am not sure why...
What would you suggest?
If you mean self-hosting email, then good luck.
It’s a lottery with the IP and even the IP space you get, whether anyone will actually receive your emails.
I hosted my own for a few years, but god fed up telling everyone to dig through their junk folder for my emails, and not being responded to very often, probably because of just that.
Maybe some providers have it better, but I tried a few and each was just not good. I really think Microsoft, Amazon, Google and other big players have intentionally separated the good, trusted IPs, ones they use for email services specifically, and made the other worse
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Those were in order (it was 15 years ago so i don't recall if all existed but at least some did). Probably ip range but who knows
Yeah, did the whole dance too, and tried multiple providers, but no dice. Some got through to others and some to others, but none was even good enough getting through to most.
This was just a few years ago.
I don’t think these safety/security signatures or protocols or whatever, work, as they are supposed to. If the IP space you get has bad reputation, nothing matters, you’re sol.
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I know there are alternatives like proton mail, tutamail, mailbox.org, etc... But what would be the issue if I create an email using my personal domain, stored in my hosting.. maybe encryption? It seems that no-one even consider this option, but I am not sure why...
What would you suggest?
I have my own domain and pay for Zoho to host my email. It works well aside from the occasional site that refuses to accept my email as valid because it's not a .com/org domain.
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I've been using my own domain pointed at Inbox.eu. They're based in the EU and I haven't had any problems, I pay for 2 users, the price is something like 12€ per user per year, so it's cheap enough for me.
Do you have alias limit per user per domain?
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Do you have alias limit per user per domain?
It's one domain per mailbox with 5 aliases per mailbox.
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It's one domain per mailbox with 5 aliases per mailbox.
Thanks
