IMail Server 5.0
In addition to basic support for POP3, IMAP4, SMTP, and several SMTP extensions, IMail Server includes many features that are common to the other systems I tested. By letting users send and receive mail from any Web browser, IMail Server's Web-messaging component eliminates the need for a mail client. The product's Web-based administration supports remote account administration and system configuration. IMail Server also includes list processing and anti-UCE features. The software's LDAP directory interface lets mail clients query the directory for email addresses and other information.
IMail Server runs as several services under NT. The software runs one service each for SMTP, POP3, IMAP4, and LDAP protocols; one service for Web messaging; one service for the list server; and one service for the product's self-monitoring feature. IMail Server's self-monitoring service is a particularly interesting feature. The service monitors each of the IMail Server services, restarts failed services, and sends event notification by email or pager. You can configure the service to monitor other services, the default gateway, and disk space.
IMail Server supports three sources for user IDs and passwords that authenticate access to mailboxes, and the software requires that you select one of the three methods when you install IMail Server. You can base user accounts on the Windows NT Database, IMail Database, or External Database.
When you choose the Windows NT Database method, you enable email for all NT domain database accounts and let users use their NT user ID and password to access email. The software automatically creates new email accounts when you add new users to the domain accounts database. This option requires that you configure the IMail server as an NT domain controller, so that the mail server will maintain a copy of the domain accounts database.
When you choose the IMail Database option, the software stores accounts in the NT Registry. In addition to using the IMail Administrator to manage user accounts, you can also import accounts from the NT accounts database when you use the IMail Database option. However, accounts you import from the NT accounts database don't retain their password from that account—you must specify a password that the IMail Database will maintain.
External Database is IMail Server's third option to store user information and authenticate mailbox access. As with the IMail Database option, you use IMail Administrator to add and remove accounts from an external database. When you use an external database, you must write a DLL program to provide an interface between the mail system and the database.
IMail Server supports CRAM-MD5-based authentication protocols to help protect user passwords as they pass through the network. IMail Server documentation doesn't specify which secure protocols the software uses for client access. When I tried to use Secure Password Authentication from Outlook, the authentication operation failed. However, when I used Eudora Pro, IMAP use of the CRAM-MD5 authentication was successful. POP use of APOP also failed, but Remote Passphrase Authentication (RPA) was successful.
Installation. Installing IMail Server was easy. The setup.exe program asks for a target directory for the program and requires you to choose between IMail Database and Windows NT Database accounts and to verify the mail server's host name in the DNS system. The installation wizard gives you the option to add users immediately following the installation process.
IMail Server runs 10 NT services. Eight services are set at installation to start automatically. The installation program sets the Whois and Finger services to start manually. IMail Server installs services for SMTP, POP3, IMAP4, HTTP, and LDAP; logging; password changing that supports Eudora clients; and system monitoring.
Documentation. IMail Server ships with a printed user manual that is also available as a PDF document. The manual is comprehensive and well indexed and includes all the usual installation and configuration topics. In addition, the manual includes a description of Registry settings and of the files that IMail Server uses and documents the 10 command-line utilities that are available for scripting administrative tasks for special circumstances. The IMail Administrator program includes excellent Help screens. I used the Help facility to answer several how-to questions and found the information I needed quickly each time.
Configuration and management. IMail Server offers more options for systems administration than any of the other products I tested. The IMail Administrator program runs only on the mail server and provides a GUI for administering mail domains, users, aliases, and other common functions. As Screen 3 shows, the program's left panel presents a hierarchical view of the mail server and the objects the server includes.
IMail Server stores system configuration parameters in the NT Registry and installs a Control Panel applet to manage these stored parameters. IMail User Manager is an alternative GUI for managing user accounts. IMail User Manager's functionality is duplicated in IMail Administrator, but some users might find its presentation of user account management tasks easier to use than IMail Administrator's.
You can administer IMail Server remotely via the Web and by using the iradmin.exe remote administration utility. Iradmin.exe supports only basic user management (i.e., the ability to change passwords and add users and aliases). The Web interface lets systems administrators perform most of the functions that IMail Administrator supports but with a different UI.
IMail Server doesn't have a GUI to let you perform system tuning and administration tasks. Instead, IMail Server documentation tells you how to make changes to the NT Registry to accomplish these tasks.
When you want to import NT accounts, the software lets you select only accounts from the local accounts database. If you want to import accounts from the domain database, you must take another approach, such as extracting account names to a test file and editing the file to call the supplied adduser.exe command-line utility.
For large installations, IMail Server supports the use of several IMail Server servers working together in a peer relationship. Linking servers lets you configure one server for Windows NT Database mailbox configuration and configure additional servers for IMail Database or External Database.
POP, IMAP, and Web access. IMail Server's POP3 and IMAP4 access was unsurprising. I used Outlook Express to send and receive mail in POP3 and IMAP4 modes. In IMAP4 mode, I could create additional folders and move messages between folders. The LDAP server returned potential email recipients when I queried the server for a partial name.
IMail Server's integrated Web access is easy to implement and use. Web-access support doesn't require additional software, and you can configure the support for access at the standard TCP/IP port for HTTP traffic (i.e., port 80) or for another port if you have another Web server on your system. The Web interface lets you access all folders, create new folder hierarchies, and move mail between folders. However, the software contains no interface to LDAP services for locating email addresses.
List-server features. The product supports standard list-server features. For example, lists can be moderated or unmoderated, and users can subscribe and unsubscribe to public lists. Lists can also be private, so that the software rejects subscribe commands and the list administrator controls list membership. Messages users send to a list will either reflect to the members of the list immediately or collect for periodic distribution if you set the list to digest mode. However, list members can't choose their message delivery mode, as they can with many list servers.
Performance. IMail Server placed last in my performance testing, with a maximum throughput of just under 24tps. If you need maximum performance for large user loads or active mailing lists, consider another product. However, if those needs don't pertain to your organization, you needn't be concerned about IMail Server's throughput limitation. Despite the product's relatively slow performance, it has plenty of speed for the average organization.
Final valuation. IMail Server has many features that the other products didn't have—including service monitoring and automatic mail account creation for NT users. At $1495, IMail Server was also the most value-priced package for unlimited client connections. With a good list-server feature set, a Web-based mail client, multiple-server support, and a host of other features, IMail Server can likely offer the functionality you need.
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