[SOLVED] Zimbra reporting/management (Mailscanner?)

[ekkas]

I have a HA Zimbra installation at a client, running Heartbeat and DRBD to mirror the boxes. The primary one is a dedicated server and the secondary is a VM on a XenServer, just in case things go pear shaped.

The client used to have Mailscanner in front of an Exchange server which I trashed at the earliest conveniece. ;-)

However, now that they are just using Zimbra, the client is starting to miss the additional functionality that Mailscanner gave them, being able to release mail and better manage spam-filtering and better reporting.

After seeing some posts dating back to 2006, I would like to enquire about 3 things (in order of importance):
1) any success in installing mailscanner on the same box as Zimbra? As the client need absolute mail reliability, we already have 2 servers running HA for Zimbra and I'd hate to have to add another 2 (for fail over) if I want to add Mailscanner. So to get a way to install mailscanner on the same box would be just perfect.
2) Is there any better silimar spam/reporting/management utilities for Zimbra in the pipeline?
3) Is there a better reporting facility, like a log of mails sent/received, mail volume per user per day, etc.etc. without a manually parsing through the logs on a per-user basis? If the worst comes to worst, I'll have to write a Windows app that parse the Zimbra logs...

[uxbod]

Bug 19152 - RFE: Spam statistics

You should be able to install MailScanner on the same server though you would need to reconfigure the SMTP ports that Zimbra listens on. You would also need to either move the Zimbra web interface onto another port; or put MailWatch onto a different port.

[phoenix]

You can install mailscanner on the same box as Zimbra but my suggestion would be to use MailCleaner (check the current beta version, it's free & Open Source) in front of your Zimbra server on a separate box.

I've edited the above link to reflect the Open Source version not the commercial one that I posted originally.

[ekkas]

If it's just a matter of changing ports, then I can live with that, thanks for the tip.
The bug report (since version 5) is admirable, but is there any chance of this being addesssed before we all die in 2012? (tongue in the cheek of course)
If so, then we'll hang on for now, otherwise I'll have to go ahead and try out the Mailscanner option on a test machine...

[ekkas]

Thank Phoenix, but due to us already running 2 machines to eliminate possible failures/downtime, I cannot install a seperate machine as that will also have to be duplicated then (datacentre costs is already high!). This company is very dependant on email and is therefore obsessed (for good reason) with HA and cannot afford a single point of failure.

[Klug]

MailCleaner (go to their forum to download the last 2009 edition, not the 2006 edition available from the website) can be run in a VM and as cluster (several MailCleaners, single management).

I don't imagine changing SMTP port on ZCS (even if only ZWC is used) in order to run another MTA on port 25 of the same server.

However, having an independant (VM on another server or another server) MTA (MailCleaner) is good as it allows you to spool the mails while you're doing maintenance (update, etc) on the ZCS servers.

You can have a shared MailCleaner instance (or better, cluster) run by you for several customers.
That's what I run, a pair of MailCleaner servers acting as MX for >100 domains (domains being hosted either on ZCS NE, ZCS OSE, qmail, Exchange, in datacentres or in customers premises).

[reivilob]

Hi

Nice config Klug !

And now you can download the Community Edition 2010 Beta 3 from the website:
mailcleaner.org

Best regards
O Bourgeois
MailCleaner

[sevilla]

Mailscanner and MailClean seems to be good AntiSpam systems. The problem here is how integrate with Zimbra.

If the AS is installed on a separate server, this server need to be the MX of the domain. So, how the AS will lookup the zimbra users?

[phoenix]

Originally Posted by sevilla

If the AS is installed on a separate server, this server need to be the MX of the domain. So, how the AS will lookup the zimbra users?

It tells you in the documentation for both of those products, it does a look-up against the Zimbra server.

[uxbod]

Postfix on the AS server can be configured to query the Zimbra LDAP database for the users.