Yosemite Server fetch mails

fetchmail ceased to be bundled with server a while ago (it was last bundled with Lion), but it still works.

You'll need Xcode installed in order to do the next step, since we are compelling from source.

1. Download fetchmail sources from: http://sourceforge.net/projects/fetchmail/
2. unzip it to the destination you want.
3. cd to the appropriate directory
4. type: ./configure ENTER
5. type: make ENTER
6. type: sudo make install ENTER

I've got it in /usr/local (bin/ and etc/) so on my setup, fetchmail is run from launchd with the command /usr/local/bin/fetchmail -f /usr/local/etc/fetchmailrc and set to re-launch if the path /usr/local/etc/fetchmailrc changes.

/Library/LaunchDaemons/local.fetchmail.plist

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>

<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">

Get the SSL fingerprints for the appropriate servers, with

openssl s_client -connect pop.mail.yahoo.com:995 -showcerts | openssl x509 -fingerprint -noout -md5

And fetchmailrc looks like:

/usr/local/etc/fetchmailrc

I was pleased to be able to help. I document what I've done for my own records, (it's easy to forget the details otherwise when a new OS version comes along, or I need to reinstall), so it was all there, and thus easy to share.

To use SSL, first the web site needs to support it. Normally, for each provider, you search for POP and IMAP support and look up what they tell you to do (what servers you need to use) to access them

So, for instance, if you are using SSL and POP on pop.example.com, and it says use port 998, then you need to fetch the SSL finger print using

openssl s_client -connect pop.example.com:995 -showcerts | openssl x509 -fingerprint -noout -md5

If you are using SSL and IMAP in map.mail.example.com and it says use port 993, then the command is

openssl s_client -connect map.mail.example.com:993 -showcerts | openssl x509 -fingerprint -noout -md5

Then you need to set up fetchmailrc appropriately.

So, if you were using POP, on Yahoo, and your Yahoo account was ME_YAHOO with password PASSW0RD and you want mail delivered to REAL_ME on the server, it looks something like:

poll Yahoo proto pop3 auth password via pop.mail.yahoo.com user "ME_YAHOO" pass "PASSW0RD" smtpname REAL_ME ssl sslfingerprint '11:22:33:44:55:66:77:88:99:AA:BB:CC:DD:EE:FF:00' smtp /var/run/dovecot/lmtp

If you were using IMAP on example.com it might look like

poll Example proto imap via imap.mail.example.com user "ME_YAHOO" pass "PASSW0RD" smtpname REAL_ME sslfingerprint '11:22:33:44:55:66:77:88:99:AA:BB:CC:DD:EE:FF:00' smtp /var/run/dovecot/lmtp

You may or may not need the ssl keyword, and the auth password. You need to tune for each server.

Glad I could help.

Hello? I'm trying to configure email server on Yosemite v10.10. But what applications need to create email server? Please tell me if your server works fine?

Hi Michael,

Nice explanation, thanks !

One point, the plist file gave me an "109: Invalid property list"

After running plutil -lint /Library/LaunchDaemons/local.fetchmail.plist

It pointed out that the part <string>Background</key> gave the error.

Changed it to <string>Background</string> and now it works perfectly on a OSX 10.10 mini server.

Regards,

John

Thanks for pointing that out.

I just checked /Library/LaunchDaemons/local.fetchmail.plist and found that is does in fact end

  <string>Background</string>
</dict>
</plist>

so it appears the error was in my transcription

Hi Michael,

have you tried fetchmail - and your tutorial on El Capitan Server.

I an thinking of migrating my servers from Mavericks to El Capitan.

The first test migration turned out bad, fetchmail wouldn't work.

Regards

Felix