Built-in SMTP server / MTA

[knadh]

If listmonk comes with a built-in SMTP server, it may be a big value add for the long tail of users with small to medium sized mailing lists. Of course, there may be SPF/DKIM/DMARC/IP reputation hassles to deal with, but it would make listmonk truly standalone and self-contained. emersion/go-smtp looks like a good lib for this.

I'm still ruminating on the idea. Opening this issue in case anyone has any thoughts.

[jackdanielux]

+1 to this.

Assuming thr IP of the SMTP will be same as that of underlying server below are the concerns:

The IP where listmonk is hosted will have a lot of impact on the deliverability.

Plus popular hosts simply prohibit using full blown SMTP on their VPS.

I've got couple droplets of mine banned from DO for doing this.

Plus AWS IPs of EC2 are highly spammed so using the internal IP might again affect deliverability.

Coming to SPF, DKIM etc. All of this can be managed within the DNS providers console itself, people should know what values to put where, maybe as a part of the documentation itself we can put it up. I struggled a lot initially while setting up but it was a breeze once I knew what to put where.

On Tue, 19 Oct, 2021, 7:53 pm Kailash Nadh, @.***> wrote:

If listmonk comes with a built-in SMTP server, it may be a big value add for the long tail of users with small to medium sized mailing lists. Of course, there may be SPF/DKIM/DMARC/IP reputation hassles to deal with, but it would make listmonk truly standalone and self-contained. emersion/go-smtp https://github.com/emersion/go-smtp looks like a good lib for this.

I'm still ruminating on the idea. Opening this issue in case anyone has any thoughts.

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[bamboowonder]

I don't think this is a good idea. From many years experience sending. IP/Domain reputation is a big deal. So are DKIM/SPF/DMARC What is the point of sending if the email doesn't reach the inbox? Considering how easy and low cost it is to setup an account with AWS SES or Sendgrid, where you'll be sending from a pool of well managed IPs. Especially for low volume senders, it is foolhardy to send from a VPS/host and try to manage their own IP reputation. Including an SMTP server without adequate education, setup (dkim/spf), would be more of a disservice to naive senders who think it is worth it to try to manage reputation yourself. Just my two cents.

[knadh]

IP/Domain reputation is a big deal. So are DKIM/SPF/DMARC What is the point of sending if the email doesn't reach the inbox?

That's right, but if somebody wants to put in the effort, they can (we do this at work successfully).

it is foolhardy to send from a VPS/host and try to manage their own IP reputation.

That could be said of self-hosting a mailing list manager too!

would be more of a disservice to naive senders who think it is worth it to try to manage reputation yourself.

I don't think this is right. One could compare self-hosting with SaaS offerings and say that self-hosting and self-managing is a disservice.

The argument that non-savvy users won't able to manage this isn't strong. Something like this, an optional feature, would be meant for users who want to use it willingly.

[andreafa]

Hello Kailash, I've been working with smtp servers for a while. In my opinion it's another job, which will distract you from developing the core features of Listmonk.

The number of support requests related to delivery issues will also increase. Someone else should take care of it.

[ChrisTG742]

IP/Domain reputation is a big deal. So are DKIM/SPF/DMARC What is the point of sending if the email doesn't reach the inbox?

I second this. As phishing attempts raise constantly, the automated technics to separate ham from spam are also getting more and more picky. We had to do a lot of efforts to finally get the automated mails get into the users's inboxes instead of being declared as spam every time. In the end we decided to put all mail traffic trough a dedicated mail-gateway which has a public IP that is trusted by other mailservers. That's the IP-blacklist issue one simply can't fight against locally. Many providers consider SMTP-hosts running on dial-ins or customer IPs to be untrustworthy. So I can imagine how much un-solvable support regarding the SMTP-service solely this circumstance could generate.

TL;DR: I'm consitent with @andreafa and also wouldn't bother to tilt at windmills in this case.

[bamboowonder]

@knadh I guess it comes down to, what is your vision for Listmonk? Everyone wants a free/cheap mailchimp alternative.
If you added an smtp/mta, you'd get a lot more users potentially. Do you and/or this community want to deal with all the support/education that will be required by adding that feature? as @andreafa mentioned. The reality is that email and deliverability are hard, and ESPs do a good job of making the difficult bits manageable, even if they are often overpriced. It is just so easy and cheap to setup SES or sendgrid and focus on what you are good at/want to be doing. Whether or not this is added, I think that having a good tutorial and documentation to walk people through what they need to take care of with spf/dkim/dmarc would really benefit all users of Listmonk.

[atomtigerzoo]

I would leave it out. There are loads of offers one can choose to send out the actual mails. It will be taken care of reliability, reputation, spam, bounces etc. I would never use my own SMPT or IP to send out lots of mails because it could harm the reputation of the whole server/network/provider.

As one said, it will also raise new issues on deliver/reputation/block/sending problems.

[knadh]

Thank you everyone for the feedback. Until there is a strong enough reason to revisit this, putting this idea on the back burner.