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Show HN: World's easiest email hosting

15 points by dejan 11y ago

aeden 11y ago
I can't tell from the guides or the site, is Migadu running a hosted email system? Anyone tried it yet? If it is hosted, I wonder what their deliverability rates and reliability look like?
- aeden 11y ago
  I just set up a test to see how it works. The UI is pretty clean, and yes, it's hosted email. No idea how reliable they will be. Here are some issues: They are not picking up DNS changes in a timely fashion, specifically I confirmed all of the DNS changes they requested were made and published to all name servers, but their system is not picking up the changes, which means they could be caching the results or asking a caching resolver when checking the results. They also have some DNS weirdness going on for their migadu.com zone which they probably should fix: ; <<>> DiG 9.8.3-P1 <<>> @ns1.migadu.com migadu.com ; (1 server found) ;; global options: +cmd ;; Got answer: ;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 34597 ;; flags: qr aa rd; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 4, ADDITIONAL: 16 ;; WARNING: recursion requested but not available ;; QUESTION SECTION: ;migadu.com. IN A ;; ANSWER SECTION: migadu.com. 300 IN A 94.23.26.57 ;; AUTHORITY SECTION: migadu.com. 300 IN NS ns1.migadu.com. migadu.com. 300 IN NS ns2.migadu.com. migadu.com. 300 IN NS ns1.migadu.com. migadu.com. 300 IN NS ns2.migadu.com. ;; ADDITIONAL SECTION: ns1.migadu.com. 300 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns1.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns1.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns1.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns1.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns1.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns1.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns1.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns2.migadu.com. 300 IN A 162.243.253.115 ns2.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 162.243.253.115 ns2.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 162.243.253.115 ns2.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 162.243.253.115 ns2.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 162.243.253.115 ns2.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 162.243.253.115 ns2.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 162.243.253.115 ns2.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 162.243.253.115 ;; Query time: 311 msec ;; SERVER: 188.166.110.130#53(188.166.110.130) ;; WHEN: Thu Feb 25 12:18:22 2016 ;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 364 Their webmail client is pretty basic. Using the refresh did not work well (spinning busy icon). It's a lot to ask to have a good webmail client in addition to handling email deliverability well. I sent myself a test email a few minutes ago and so far it's not come through in their web UI. Bottom line: it's an early product in a very challenging operational space, so I'd keep an eye on them but would think twice about relying on it for production use.
  - dejan 11y ago
    Hi @aeden, Dejan from Migadu here. Thanks for the check-up :) Migadu has to pickup the DNS changes in order to activate the domain, otherwise it won't accept mails for it. Webmail, yes quite basic, we're hoping to make it even more basic. No intentions to replace GMail :)
  - timo_reiner 11y ago
    I've used it now for a couple of weeks and worked fine so far.
arsalanb 11y ago
Correct me if I'm wrong, do you guys limit the number of messages sent on a daily basis?
- dejan 11y ago
  yes - on the free plan, 10 per day, per Migadu account.
  - boredpudding 11y ago
    Why did you guys choose for a 'Pro' plan instead of pay what you use? I have a small webdev agency with 25 clients, who together send more than 100 mails a day. Currently I use a managed VPS for that, but I want to move to something that is fully managed, scalable and has a great API. Not to bash on the 'Pro' plan. Just curious on why, and I hope you guys offer 'pay what you use' in the future. The service looks promising.
    - dejan 11y ago
      Honestly, the limitation is there so we start a conversation, and figure out a better pricing. It's easy to slam 10 different plans on the page, but it just adds to the confusion, and none to the learning. We're maybe overthinking simplification... If you think Migadu could work for your agency, lets get in touch, the limit of 100 is customizable.
zaphoyd 11y ago
The FAQ states that they don't support catch all email addresses. Does anyone know of a service like this that does?
- dejan 11y ago
  We intentionally don't do it, after long debate. Why would you want a catch-all, curiously?
  - franciscop 11y ago
    Maybe set up an option to enable it if it's easy to implement? Because people make typos or you might want to make up addresses on the fly similarly to mailinator (but with corporate addresses).
    - dejan 11y ago
      The downside is that you will catch all spam too, and more importantly you will not bounce back the message to the sender informing them they've sent to the wrong address.
  - th0br0 11y ago
    Very simple reason: have a separate email for each website that requires a signup. That way, you'll know directly which website leaked your email address to some spammers.
    - dejan 11y ago
      I use aliases for that reason, much cleaner IMHO.
      - th0br0 11y ago
        Whoops. Looks like I totally misread that OP. Yeah... aliases is what I was thinking about as well. Although, separate email adresses in conjunction with a catch-all are better. After all, with an alias, you can just cut the recipient's address off just before the + which isn't that big a hurdle to spammers...
scrollaway 11y ago
This looks awesome. Is there such a thing for self-hosting as well? As a sysadmin, the time I'm dealing with dovecot, postfix, exim and the whole lot feels like the stuff I'll be watching reruns of for eternity down in hell.
iliaznk 11y ago
Seems that Mailgun + Gmail would give you the same and cheaper. Am I missing something?
- dejan 11y ago
  I don't understand the question: Gmail has one address and it is not on your domain? Can you elaborate please? Simple use case: you've got several startup projects with different domains, and multiple addresses on it. Migadu makes that painless. Family domain with emails for the whole family? Easy. And..of course there are many alternatives. No intention to reinvent email here. Just making things more pleasurable to manage and use, by getting them out of the way.
  - iliaznk 11y ago
    I mean, with Mailgun you can have inbound email addresses on your domain forwarded to a Gmail inbox, for example, and Gmail also allows you to send email on behalf of those imported email addresses.
    - dejan 11y ago
      Good idea, but don't you think it can get a bit crazy if you need to do that for multiple persons on multiple domains? We were also doing similar combinations for our startup projects via Google Apps and Mandrill, but it was getting very messy. I just wanted a new domain / new email address, fast. Nothing else. Somehow I would end up with multiple Google accounts, and then Google cut of the free accounts... Interestingly, Mandrill announced the same thing today. I'd rather give up two cups of coffee a month and not waste brainwaves and worries on this admin. Migadu is meant to get email admin out of people's way so they can focus on more important stuff.
      - iliaznk 11y ago
        Ok, good thing. Good luck to you!
Grue3 11y ago
Can I send email as admin@mysite.com through this (actual site is hosted on Linode)? I've been using mandrillapp for this purpose, but it is going paid-only so I'm looking for alternatives.
- iliaznk 11y ago
  With Mailgun you can and almost for free (10,000 messages per month).
  - dejan 11y ago
    Actually, you can also with Migadu, for free. You'll just get a "Sent via Migadu" signature on the bottom. And almost free without the signature :) However, if you need to send thousands of messages a day, you are probably sending automated mails, transactional or newsletters. Migadu is not intended for that, just as Gmail isn't. You don't need Mailgun for that either, you can setup your own server to send mails on DO, or go for Amazon SES (Simple Email Service), cost is negligible.
- michael956 11y ago
  Hi Grue, Michael from migadu.com here. Yes, sure you can. We are only email service. You can have your site wherever you want.

15 points by dejan 11y ago

aeden 11y ago

I can't tell from the guides or the site, is Migadu running a hosted email system? Anyone tried it yet? If it is hosted, I wonder what their deliverability rates and reliability look like?

aeden 11y ago
I just set up a test to see how it works. The UI is pretty clean, and yes, it's hosted email. No idea how reliable they will be. Here are some issues: They are not picking up DNS changes in a timely fashion, specifically I confirmed all of the DNS changes they requested were made and published to all name servers, but their system is not picking up the changes, which means they could be caching the results or asking a caching resolver when checking the results. They also have some DNS weirdness going on for their migadu.com zone which they probably should fix: ; <<>> DiG 9.8.3-P1 <<>> @ns1.migadu.com migadu.com ; (1 server found) ;; global options: +cmd ;; Got answer: ;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 34597 ;; flags: qr aa rd; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 4, ADDITIONAL: 16 ;; WARNING: recursion requested but not available ;; QUESTION SECTION: ;migadu.com. IN A ;; ANSWER SECTION: migadu.com. 300 IN A 94.23.26.57 ;; AUTHORITY SECTION: migadu.com. 300 IN NS ns1.migadu.com. migadu.com. 300 IN NS ns2.migadu.com. migadu.com. 300 IN NS ns1.migadu.com. migadu.com. 300 IN NS ns2.migadu.com. ;; ADDITIONAL SECTION: ns1.migadu.com. 300 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns1.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns1.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns1.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns1.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns1.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns1.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns1.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 188.166.110.130 ns2.migadu.com. 300 IN A 162.243.253.115 ns2.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 162.243.253.115 ns2.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 162.243.253.115 ns2.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 162.243.253.115 ns2.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 162.243.253.115 ns2.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 162.243.253.115 ns2.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 162.243.253.115 ns2.migadu.com. 259200 IN A 162.243.253.115 ;; Query time: 311 msec ;; SERVER: 188.166.110.130#53(188.166.110.130) ;; WHEN: Thu Feb 25 12:18:22 2016 ;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 364 Their webmail client is pretty basic. Using the refresh did not work well (spinning busy icon). It's a lot to ask to have a good webmail client in addition to handling email deliverability well. I sent myself a test email a few minutes ago and so far it's not come through in their web UI. Bottom line: it's an early product in a very challenging operational space, so I'd keep an eye on them but would think twice about relying on it for production use.
- dejan 11y ago
  Hi @aeden, Dejan from Migadu here. Thanks for the check-up :) Migadu has to pickup the DNS changes in order to activate the domain, otherwise it won't accept mails for it. Webmail, yes quite basic, we're hoping to make it even more basic. No intentions to replace GMail :)
- timo_reiner 11y ago
  I've used it now for a couple of weeks and worked fine so far.

arsalanb 11y ago

Correct me if I'm wrong, do you guys limit the number of messages sent on a daily basis?

dejan 11y ago
yes - on the free plan, 10 per day, per Migadu account.
- boredpudding 11y ago
  Why did you guys choose for a 'Pro' plan instead of pay what you use? I have a small webdev agency with 25 clients, who together send more than 100 mails a day. Currently I use a managed VPS for that, but I want to move to something that is fully managed, scalable and has a great API. Not to bash on the 'Pro' plan. Just curious on why, and I hope you guys offer 'pay what you use' in the future. The service looks promising.
  - dejan 11y ago
    Honestly, the limitation is there so we start a conversation, and figure out a better pricing. It's easy to slam 10 different plans on the page, but it just adds to the confusion, and none to the learning. We're maybe overthinking simplification... If you think Migadu could work for your agency, lets get in touch, the limit of 100 is customizable.

zaphoyd 11y ago

The FAQ states that they don't support catch all email addresses. Does anyone know of a service like this that does?

dejan 11y ago
We intentionally don't do it, after long debate. Why would you want a catch-all, curiously?
- franciscop 11y ago
  Maybe set up an option to enable it if it's easy to implement? Because people make typos or you might want to make up addresses on the fly similarly to mailinator (but with corporate addresses).
  - dejan 11y ago
    The downside is that you will catch all spam too, and more importantly you will not bounce back the message to the sender informing them they've sent to the wrong address.
- th0br0 11y ago
  Very simple reason: have a separate email for each website that requires a signup. That way, you'll know directly which website leaked your email address to some spammers.
  - dejan 11y ago
    I use aliases for that reason, much cleaner IMHO.
    - th0br0 11y ago
      Whoops. Looks like I totally misread that OP. Yeah... aliases is what I was thinking about as well. Although, separate email adresses in conjunction with a catch-all are better. After all, with an alias, you can just cut the recipient's address off just before the + which isn't that big a hurdle to spammers...

scrollaway 11y ago

This looks awesome. Is there such a thing for self-hosting as well? As a sysadmin, the time I'm dealing with dovecot, postfix, exim and the whole lot feels like the stuff I'll be watching reruns of for eternity down in hell.

iliaznk 11y ago

Seems that Mailgun + Gmail would give you the same and cheaper. Am I missing something?

dejan 11y ago
I don't understand the question: Gmail has one address and it is not on your domain? Can you elaborate please? Simple use case: you've got several startup projects with different domains, and multiple addresses on it. Migadu makes that painless. Family domain with emails for the whole family? Easy. And..of course there are many alternatives. No intention to reinvent email here. Just making things more pleasurable to manage and use, by getting them out of the way.
- iliaznk 11y ago
  I mean, with Mailgun you can have inbound email addresses on your domain forwarded to a Gmail inbox, for example, and Gmail also allows you to send email on behalf of those imported email addresses.
  - dejan 11y ago
    Good idea, but don't you think it can get a bit crazy if you need to do that for multiple persons on multiple domains? We were also doing similar combinations for our startup projects via Google Apps and Mandrill, but it was getting very messy. I just wanted a new domain / new email address, fast. Nothing else. Somehow I would end up with multiple Google accounts, and then Google cut of the free accounts... Interestingly, Mandrill announced the same thing today. I'd rather give up two cups of coffee a month and not waste brainwaves and worries on this admin. Migadu is meant to get email admin out of people's way so they can focus on more important stuff.
    - iliaznk 11y ago
      Ok, good thing. Good luck to you!

Grue3 11y ago

Can I send email as admin@mysite.com through this (actual site is hosted on Linode)? I've been using mandrillapp for this purpose, but it is going paid-only so I'm looking for alternatives.

iliaznk 11y ago
With Mailgun you can and almost for free (10,000 messages per month).
- dejan 11y ago
  Actually, you can also with Migadu, for free. You'll just get a "Sent via Migadu" signature on the bottom. And almost free without the signature :) However, if you need to send thousands of messages a day, you are probably sending automated mails, transactional or newsletters. Migadu is not intended for that, just as Gmail isn't. You don't need Mailgun for that either, you can setup your own server to send mails on DO, or go for Amazon SES (Simple Email Service), cost is negligible.
michael956 11y ago
Hi Grue, Michael from migadu.com here. Yes, sure you can. We are only email service. You can have your site wherever you want.