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A daemon is not necessary. You only need a binary called sendmail and a configuration file saying where emails should go (i.e., local files or submitted to some
by andreasvc 12y ago
A daemon is not necessary. You only need a binary called sendmail and a configuration file saying where emails should go (i.e., local files or submitted to some external mail server).
- kstrauser 12y agoIt's not a bad idea to have an (outbound only) daemon for the sake of reliability. If the remote server is down at the moment your "command | mail user@remote" job runs, you want it to queue locally for later delivery so that the mail command can return immediately.
- andreasvc 12y agoIf you're after reliability, the default config is probably not what you want. For the default config though, it may be preferable to keep things simple. Note that a cron setup could still work without an MTA daemon.
- peterwwillis 12y agoYou're right, a daemon isn't necessary. It's just an artifact of the design of SMTP. The MTA is designed for both sending and receiving messages over a network. A daemon is the only way to meet all those requirements. For the single-user host you just need a suid-root MDA that can change users to deliver mail into different spools. The daemon is doing the same thing, except it's an MTA that calls an MDA and it uses IPC. The IPC method is technically superior for many reasons, but as you say, not necessary.