6 ms·

Show HN: LIV is a webmail front-end for your personal email server

62 points by derekzhouzhen 5y ago

steviedotboston 5y ago
Nothing will ever beat SquirrelMail
Reubend 5y ago
> How do I delete a mail? > No, you can't. To be honest, that alone makes this useless for me. Perhaps others can do fine the "archive" functionality, but that seems like a feature that I can't live without.
- nulbyte 5y ago
  De-prioritizing delete is one of the things that bugs me about Gmail, but plenty of folks seem to like keeping things around. For a while, my employer kept increasing the sizes of our email boxes. I asked if I could opt-out and was told no. I don't need 25GB for email.
  - derekzhouzhen 5y ago
    I have >70k emails in my archive, the whole mails and full text index fit in 5GB. The key is to delete all attachments. Also, very few junk mails remain in my archive with my very simple archive rule.
  - yuppie_scum 5y ago
    And Google is only doing it to scrape our data
ggm 5y ago
Interesting but a baroque implementation dependency (off the main path, good code: Erlang is minimalist heaven) and strongly dogmatic/declarative instructions. Mail is complicated. The fine article glosses over the huge pain and risks in self hosting (basically, one foot wrong and you're blacklisted by a major player) "Do it exactly this way" won't play for a lot of people
- derekzhouzhen 5y ago
  To be fair I am not suggesting people to self-host email because I know it is hard. I am suggesting LIV to people already self-host their email and want an easy web mail. Of cause LIV is not for every one; I gave plenty of warnings in the README. I only wish to see more people to write or customize software to do email exactly their way so that we can all learn from it.
hardwaresofton 5y ago
Please include a screenshot of the frontend in the README. Also a Dockerfile (and a simple one line instruction) would help this project be easier to try out.
moehm 5y ago
> All open source webmail sucks. What is the problem with Rainloop? [0] I've had no problem with fulltext search yet. Am I missing something? (Not high enough volume e.g.?) [0] https://www.rainloop.net/ https://www.rainloop.net/
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- bo1024 5y ago
  Agree, a comparison to rainloop would be nice.
- derekzhouzhen 5y ago
  I have not used that so can't comment. However, it looks like it is on top of IMAP or JMAP. I have >70K mails in my archive. Try that with IMAP and do a search and you will see what is wrong. In comparison, LIV read mails directly off the maildir. It is basically the dumb down, web version of mu (https://www.djcbsoftware.nl/code/mu/ https://www.djcbsoftware.nl/code/mu/), which LIV is based off. Maybe my statement about other open source webmail is too provoking; but I think this is one of a new kind of webmail.
  - upofadown 5y ago
    >I have 70K mails in my archive. Try that with IMAP and do a search and you will see what is wrong. Wouldn't that entirely depend on the indexing used by the IMAP server? IMAP even supports full text searches with a single command. Now if you are talking encrypted email, then, yes, IMAP is a problem for full text searches. But you can't do that server side using any method if the keys live only at the email client (as is proper).
    - derekzhouzhen 5y ago
      Indexing is no longer optional, but necessary. And once you have that, IMAP just becomes an unnecessary intermediary. Why go through IMAP when you can read the mail directly from the underlying Maildir? * If you just want to download some mails, there is the much simpler POP3 * If you want to access your mail remotely in a convenient way, there is webmail * If you want to do scripting, or advanced manual operations on your mail store, there are terminal tools IMAP can do all three but is a lousy substitute and holding you back.
PebblesHD 5y ago
Interesting idea, and certainly a welcome one as you’ve described given the state of open source web clients, but the lack of screenshots in the readme of this ultimately graphical software means you’ve not really presented any ‘proof’ that you’ve improved the situation. Also a few spelling mistakes in the config paths might be worth fixing to make sure people don’t dismiss before giving it a go. For example, the config goes into the path ‘self_configer’ which is possibly a misspelling of configure, but the result is a loss in confidence that the rest of the software is of usable quality. Nice effort, and congrats for putting it out there!
- derekzhouzhen 5y ago
  > the lack of screenshots in the readme of this ultimately graphical software means you’ve not really presented any ‘proof’ that you’ve improved the situation. I will put up some screen shots tomorrow. > For example, the config goes into the path ‘self_configer’ which is possibly a misspelling of configure, but the result is a loss in confidence that the rest of the software is of usable quality. Too late to fix that now :(
rntksi 5y ago
Thank you! This looks nice, and I like how you work with Maildir instead of IMAP
- derekzhouzhen 5y ago
  IMAP is very hard to get right. Also it is like petting your dog with a kitchen mitten. Reading mails right off the maildir is much easier.
axiosgunnar 5y ago
> front-end > no screenshots
walrus01 5y ago
> You run your own email server on your own VPS and your own domain name, serving yourself and maybe a few family members and close friends. I would not recommend doing this unless you have a really good idea what running a public facing smtpd involves in the year 2021 for full email deliverability to/from all destinations. Your main problem will be that almost certainly whatever VPS host you're on will have "polluted" IP space from previous customers and neighbouring IPs in the same netblocks. It will be something entirely beyond your control and not likely to ever get fixed. If you want to self host your own email you need an unimpeachable clean section of IP space, which these days means working with a more traditional ISP that will cost you a lot more for service per month. Like, not a $5 to $25/mo VPS, but a minimum of $150-200/mo for colocation services or a dedicated server from a hosting company that has an absolute zero tolerance abuse policy. Or if you happen to know somebody at such an ISP and can work out a friendly deal with them, that might be an option, and would involve much less money. And that's before you get into a proper SPF, DKIM and DMARC setup. re: what's "wrong" with common open source webmail IMAP clients, neither rainloop or roundcube are terribly offensive or bad. I don't see a need for a new third thing that's apparently not designed for large scale production use (both of the above are used by some large universities and others), catering to a niche market of people who want to just self-host personal email.
- iMerNibor 5y ago
  > And that's before you get into a proper SPF, DKIM and DMARC setup. only to be pushed into spam and plain rejected by "non-mainstream" email providers regardless
  - walrus01 5y ago
    yes, indeed, even if you have perfectly clean IP space and do everything flawlessly, expect months after you put it into production before email to/from anything microsoft hosted starts to work properly.
    - derekzhouzhen 5y ago
      Microsoft is not bad now; Gmail is worse. QQmail (from Tencent) is the worst of all. Or you can cheat and use sendgrid or mailgun, but that is like caving to the dark side.
dqv 5y ago
Hey! I ported switchboard from Erlang to Elixir to get a better sense about how certain Elixir constructs translate to Erlang. It's an IMAP client for Elixir which you might find useful in your project! I should really get around to creating a reference example for monitoring a single mailbox. https://github.com/voughtdq/imap https://github.com/voughtdq/imap
passerby1 5y ago
Conteinerization (docker or docker-compose if needed) is a need to avoid complex setup
- Datagenerator 5y ago
  Off-topic: Start thinking about OCI Open Container Images. Docker went commercial -but to start what is basically some processes- you have podman and Singularity now. Containers are just files running in Linux cgroups.
gigatexal 5y ago
Readme fail. No screenshots??
kissmd 5y ago
If you need help setting up containerisation, please let me know. (once you provided proof it is worth the work (ie screenshots))
yoavm 5y ago
There sounds great. I currently use Astroid that has some similar capabilities: searchability using notmuch, simple HTML rendering and Markdown composing. Would be interesting to compare the two!
- derekzhouzhen 5y ago
  Can you provide a link. I am curious.
  - yoavm 5y ago
    https://github.com/astroidmail/astroid https://github.com/astroidmail/astroid
    - derekzhouzhen 5y ago
      thanks. I used notmuch before I settle down to mu. How does astroid display HTML emails? LIV can use a sandboxed iframe becaue it is running in the browser already; a native progrem will have to embed webkit, I suppose?
      - yoavm 5y ago
        Indeed, it uses WebKitGTK I think.
derekzhouzhen 5y ago
I added a few screenshots in the README as requested by some comments here. A few also request a dockerfile; however this I can't provide, because LIV is supposed to run together with your SMTP server and read the local files for the mails. If I package LIV together with SMTP server in the same container it will be too inflexible. You don't really need a SMTP server, or VPS to try LIV. All you need are a Linux box and some mails in your maildir, and getmail can help to achieve that. You can't send mails though.
graynk 5y ago
LIV is also the name of a fairly popular VR-tool [0] for capturing in-game footage combining it with the view from real-world camera, so I was confused at first [0] - https://www.liv.tv/ https://www.liv.tv/
nocsi 5y ago
You should’ve mentioned the front end is all phoenix liveview and surface. That would’ve gotten a little different attention here
- derekzhouzhen 5y ago
  I thought liveview and surface are already mainstream enough now :) Yes, liveview totally pave the road to build data intensive and interaction intensive, server-side driven applications such as this kind of email. And without surface I can't use liveview at all. In fact, I held up from using liveview until surface is mature enough. LIV is a testament for both liveview and surface. Big kudos to the people behind them.

62 points by derekzhouzhen 5y ago

Nothing will ever beat SquirrelMail

> How do I delete a mail? > No, you can't. To be honest, that alone makes this useless for me. Perhaps others can do fine the "archive" functionality, but that seems like a feature that I can't live without.

nulbyte 5y ago
De-prioritizing delete is one of the things that bugs me about Gmail, but plenty of folks seem to like keeping things around. For a while, my employer kept increasing the sizes of our email boxes. I asked if I could opt-out and was told no. I don't need 25GB for email.
- derekzhouzhen 5y ago
  I have >70k emails in my archive, the whole mails and full text index fit in 5GB. The key is to delete all attachments. Also, very few junk mails remain in my archive with my very simple archive rule.
- yuppie_scum 5y ago
  And Google is only doing it to scrape our data

ggm 5y ago

Interesting but a baroque implementation dependency (off the main path, good code: Erlang is minimalist heaven) and strongly dogmatic/declarative instructions. Mail is complicated. The fine article glosses over the huge pain and risks in self hosting (basically, one foot wrong and you're blacklisted by a major player) "Do it exactly this way" won't play for a lot of people

derekzhouzhen 5y ago
To be fair I am not suggesting people to self-host email because I know it is hard. I am suggesting LIV to people already self-host their email and want an easy web mail. Of cause LIV is not for every one; I gave plenty of warnings in the README. I only wish to see more people to write or customize software to do email exactly their way so that we can all learn from it.

hardwaresofton 5y ago

Please include a screenshot of the frontend in the README. Also a Dockerfile (and a simple one line instruction) would help this project be easier to try out.

moehm 5y ago

> All open source webmail sucks. What is the problem with Rainloop? [0] I've had no problem with fulltext search yet. Am I missing something? (Not high enough volume e.g.?) [0] https://www.rainloop.net/ https://www.rainloop.net/

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
bo1024 5y ago
Agree, a comparison to rainloop would be nice.
derekzhouzhen 5y ago
I have not used that so can't comment. However, it looks like it is on top of IMAP or JMAP. I have >70K mails in my archive. Try that with IMAP and do a search and you will see what is wrong. In comparison, LIV read mails directly off the maildir. It is basically the dumb down, web version of mu (https://www.djcbsoftware.nl/code/mu/ https://www.djcbsoftware.nl/code/mu/), which LIV is based off. Maybe my statement about other open source webmail is too provoking; but I think this is one of a new kind of webmail.
- upofadown 5y ago
  >I have 70K mails in my archive. Try that with IMAP and do a search and you will see what is wrong. Wouldn't that entirely depend on the indexing used by the IMAP server? IMAP even supports full text searches with a single command. Now if you are talking encrypted email, then, yes, IMAP is a problem for full text searches. But you can't do that server side using any method if the keys live only at the email client (as is proper).
  - derekzhouzhen 5y ago
    Indexing is no longer optional, but necessary. And once you have that, IMAP just becomes an unnecessary intermediary. Why go through IMAP when you can read the mail directly from the underlying Maildir? * If you just want to download some mails, there is the much simpler POP3 * If you want to access your mail remotely in a convenient way, there is webmail * If you want to do scripting, or advanced manual operations on your mail store, there are terminal tools IMAP can do all three but is a lousy substitute and holding you back.

PebblesHD 5y ago

Interesting idea, and certainly a welcome one as you’ve described given the state of open source web clients, but the lack of screenshots in the readme of this ultimately graphical software means you’ve not really presented any ‘proof’ that you’ve improved the situation. Also a few spelling mistakes in the config paths might be worth fixing to make sure people don’t dismiss before giving it a go. For example, the config goes into the path ‘self_configer’ which is possibly a misspelling of configure, but the result is a loss in confidence that the rest of the software is of usable quality. Nice effort, and congrats for putting it out there!

derekzhouzhen 5y ago
> the lack of screenshots in the readme of this ultimately graphical software means you’ve not really presented any ‘proof’ that you’ve improved the situation. I will put up some screen shots tomorrow. > For example, the config goes into the path ‘self_configer’ which is possibly a misspelling of configure, but the result is a loss in confidence that the rest of the software is of usable quality. Too late to fix that now :(

rntksi 5y ago

Thank you! This looks nice, and I like how you work with Maildir instead of IMAP

derekzhouzhen 5y ago
IMAP is very hard to get right. Also it is like petting your dog with a kitchen mitten. Reading mails right off the maildir is much easier.

axiosgunnar 5y ago

> front-end > no screenshots

walrus01 5y ago

> You run your own email server on your own VPS and your own domain name, serving yourself and maybe a few family members and close friends. I would not recommend doing this unless you have a really good idea what running a public facing smtpd involves in the year 2021 for full email deliverability to/from all destinations. Your main problem will be that almost certainly whatever VPS host you're on will have "polluted" IP space from previous customers and neighbouring IPs in the same netblocks. It will be something entirely beyond your control and not likely to ever get fixed. If you want to self host your own email you need an unimpeachable clean section of IP space, which these days means working with a more traditional ISP that will cost you a lot more for service per month. Like, not a $5 to $25/mo VPS, but a minimum of $150-200/mo for colocation services or a dedicated server from a hosting company that has an absolute zero tolerance abuse policy. Or if you happen to know somebody at such an ISP and can work out a friendly deal with them, that might be an option, and would involve much less money. And that's before you get into a proper SPF, DKIM and DMARC setup. re: what's "wrong" with common open source webmail IMAP clients, neither rainloop or roundcube are terribly offensive or bad. I don't see a need for a new third thing that's apparently not designed for large scale production use (both of the above are used by some large universities and others), catering to a niche market of people who want to just self-host personal email.

iMerNibor 5y ago
> And that's before you get into a proper SPF, DKIM and DMARC setup. only to be pushed into spam and plain rejected by "non-mainstream" email providers regardless
- walrus01 5y ago
  yes, indeed, even if you have perfectly clean IP space and do everything flawlessly, expect months after you put it into production before email to/from anything microsoft hosted starts to work properly.
  - derekzhouzhen 5y ago
    Microsoft is not bad now; Gmail is worse. QQmail (from Tencent) is the worst of all. Or you can cheat and use sendgrid or mailgun, but that is like caving to the dark side.

dqv 5y ago

Hey! I ported switchboard from Erlang to Elixir to get a better sense about how certain Elixir constructs translate to Erlang. It's an IMAP client for Elixir which you might find useful in your project! I should really get around to creating a reference example for monitoring a single mailbox. https://github.com/voughtdq/imap https://github.com/voughtdq/imap

passerby1 5y ago

Conteinerization (docker or docker-compose if needed) is a need to avoid complex setup

Datagenerator 5y ago
Off-topic: Start thinking about OCI Open Container Images. Docker went commercial -but to start what is basically some processes- you have podman and Singularity now. Containers are just files running in Linux cgroups.

gigatexal 5y ago

Readme fail. No screenshots??

kissmd 5y ago

If you need help setting up containerisation, please let me know. (once you provided proof it is worth the work (ie screenshots))

yoavm 5y ago

There sounds great. I currently use Astroid that has some similar capabilities: searchability using notmuch, simple HTML rendering and Markdown composing. Would be interesting to compare the two!

derekzhouzhen 5y ago
Can you provide a link. I am curious.
- yoavm 5y ago
  https://github.com/astroidmail/astroid https://github.com/astroidmail/astroid
  - derekzhouzhen 5y ago
    thanks. I used notmuch before I settle down to mu. How does astroid display HTML emails? LIV can use a sandboxed iframe becaue it is running in the browser already; a native progrem will have to embed webkit, I suppose?
    - yoavm 5y ago
      Indeed, it uses WebKitGTK I think.

derekzhouzhen 5y ago

I added a few screenshots in the README as requested by some comments here. A few also request a dockerfile; however this I can't provide, because LIV is supposed to run together with your SMTP server and read the local files for the mails. If I package LIV together with SMTP server in the same container it will be too inflexible. You don't really need a SMTP server, or VPS to try LIV. All you need are a Linux box and some mails in your maildir, and getmail can help to achieve that. You can't send mails though.

graynk 5y ago

LIV is also the name of a fairly popular VR-tool [0] for capturing in-game footage combining it with the view from real-world camera, so I was confused at first [0] - https://www.liv.tv/ https://www.liv.tv/

nocsi 5y ago

You should’ve mentioned the front end is all phoenix liveview and surface. That would’ve gotten a little different attention here

derekzhouzhen 5y ago
I thought liveview and surface are already mainstream enough now :) Yes, liveview totally pave the road to build data intensive and interaction intensive, server-side driven applications such as this kind of email. And without surface I can't use liveview at all. In fact, I held up from using liveview until surface is mature enough. LIV is a testament for both liveview and surface. Big kudos to the people behind them.