[gentoo-user] Alternate Incoming Mail Server

[Ashley Dixon]

Hello,

After many hours of confusing mixtures of pain and pleasure, I have a secure and
well-behaved e-mail server which encompasses all the features I originally
desired. However, in the event that I need to reboot the server (perhaps a
kernel update was added to Portage), I would like to have a miniature mail
server which catches incoming mail if, and only if, my primary server is down.

I have Gentoo installation on an old Raspberry Pi (model B+), and was curious if
such a set-up was possible ? I also want the solution to be as minimal as
possible. I see the problem as three parts:

 (a) Convincing the D.N.S.\ and my router to redirect mail to the alternate
 server, should the default one not be reachable;
 
 (b) Creating the alternate mail server to be as lightweight as possible. I'm
 not even sure if I need an S.M.T.P.\ server (postfix). Would courier-imap do
 the trick on its own (with courier-authlib and mysql) ?

 (c) Moving mail from the alternate server to the main server once the latter
 has regained conciousness. I realise this is a slightly different problem, and
 is not even necessarily _required_ for operation, although it's certainly a
 nice-to-have.

What do you think; is this at all possible ? Has anyone here done anything like
this before ?

Thanks in advance.

-- 

Ashley Dixon
suugaku.co.uk

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