Setting Up Mail Server Operation for CentOS Web Panel Web Hosting Control Panel on Amazon AWS Cloud

Subject: Setting Up Mail Server Operation for CentOS Web Panel Web Hosting Control Panel on Amazon AWS Cloud

Author: Mr. Turritopsis Dohrnii Teo En Ming, Singapore
Date: 25 Feb 2020 Tuesday

PREREQUISITES
=============

Before embarking on this guide, you should read the following guide first.

Guide: Mr. Teo En Ming's Guide to Deploying CentOS Web Panel (CWP) Web Hosting Control Panel on Amazon AWS Cloud

Redundant blog links:

[1] https://tdtemcerts.blogspot.com/2020/02/mr-teo-en-mings-guide-to-deploying.html

[2] https://tdtemcerts.wordpress.com/2020/02/23/mr-teo-en-mings-guide-to-deploying-centos-web-panel-cwp-web-hosting-control-panel-on-amazon-aws-cloud/

EXTREMELY DETAILED INSTRUCTIONS OF TEO EN MING'S GUIDE
======================================================

Teo En Ming's DNS Zone File for domain teo-en-ming.com on Primary DNS Server
============================================================================

$TTL    300
@       IN      SOA     ns1.teo-en-ming.com. ceo.teo-en-ming.com. (
         2020022502     ; Serial
             604800     ; Refresh
              86400     ; Retry
            2419200     ; Expire
             604800 )   ; Negative Cache TTL
;
; name servers - NS records
     IN      NS      ns1.teo-en-ming.com.
     IN      NS      ns2.teo-en-ming.com.

; mail servers - MX records
     IN      MX      0 mail.teo-en-ming.com.

; name servers - A records
ns1.teo-en-ming.com.          IN      A       13.58.253.162
ns2.teo-en-ming.com.          IN      A       3.20.186.205

; mail servers - A records
mail.teo-en-ming.com.       IN      A       3.21.30.127

; Additional A records
www.teo-en-ming.com.          IN      A       3.21.30.127
teo-en-ming.com.       IN      A       3.21.30.127

; Sender Policy Framework (SPF) TXT records
teo-en-ming.com.       IN      TXT     "v=spf1 ip4:3.21.30.127 -all"

===EOF===

REFERENCE
=========

Guide: Mail Exchange Record (MX)

Link: https://www.zytrax.com/books/dns/ch8/mx.html

REFERENCE
=========

Guide: How To: Lowering Your DNS TTLs

Link: https://www.liquidweb.com/kb/how-to-lowering-your-dns-ttls/

REFERENCE
=========

Discussion: Postfix: “Connection timed out” on all outbound email [closed]

Link: https://serverfault.com/questions/585503/postfix-connection-timed-out-on-all-outbound-email

QUOTE:

"For anyone who found this question but is on AWS EC2: outgoing SMTP intentionally rate limited, but you can ask to have it relaxed."

REFERENCE
=========

Discussion: Intermittent exim gmail smtp connection timeout

Link: https://forums.cpanel.net/threads/intermittent-exim-gmail-smtp-connection-timeout.523911/

QUOTE:

"Just an update for anyone with a similar issue - with some fresh eyes and some more googling it sounds like this may be caused by some SMTP rate limitations built into the AWS EC2 network as Spam prevention.

They have a form to register to remove outgoing smtp connection limitations here:

https://aws.amazon.com/forms/ec2-email-limit-rdns-request

I've submitted and will update if this resolves the issues I was seeing."

QUOTE:

"Amazon SMTP traffic management indeed seems to have been the cause. Within a couple of hours of filling out the above form, I got an email confirmation from AWS that "traffic restrictions had been removed" and normal function resumed immediately.

Confusing the matters is that this SMTP traffic management is not documented well (and sometimes with contradicting information). It does not appear to be a hard cap limit, nor does it trigger any notification when it's applied - it actually appears to be a *throttle* on common SMTP ports, triggered by a very small number of connections, beyond which it allows a certain number of connections per/hour - which would absolutely create the kind of "intermittent" connectivity issues I saw (and the odd delivery order of mail in the queue depending on when a retry "won the lottery" to negotiate a connection).

Anyway - I hope that info is of some use to others in the future!"

REFERENCE
=========

Guide: Installing Telnet In CentOS/RHEL/Scientific Linux 6 & 7

Link: https://www.unixmen.com/installing-telnet-centosrhelscientific-linux-6-7/

Amazon Web Services' Reply to Teo En Ming
=========================================

Hello,

We approved your request for the removal of the EC2 email sending limitations on your Amazon Web Services account! If you requested removal of email sending limits on any other Amazon Elastic IPs, they've also been removed.

Because reverse DNS record entries are commonly considered in anti-spam filters, we recommend assigning a reverse DNS record to the Elastic IP address you use to send email to third parties. Please use the form located at this link to request a reverse DNS entry:
https://aws-portal.amazon.com/gp/aws/html-forms-controller/contactus/ec2-email-limit-rdns-request

If you'd like to proceed with assigning a reverse DNS record to the Elastic IP, the first step would be to configure the A record for the domain to match the desired PTR record on your side.

Please follow the instructions at the link below to create the A record:
https://docs.aws.amazon.com/Route53/latest/DeveloperGuide/resource-record-sets-creating.html

Please let us know if you have any questions.

Regards,
Amazon Web Services

REFERENCE
=========

Guide: How to create an SPF TXT record?

Link: https://www.dmarcanalyzer.com/spf/how-to-create-an-spf-txt-record/

REFERENCE
=========

Guide: Linux BIND DNS Configure Sender Policy Framework ( SPF ) an e-mail Anti Forgery System

Link: https://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/howto-bind-djbdns-spf-antispam-dns-configuration/

Creating New User Account in CentOS Web Panel
=============================================

Login to CentOS Web Panel Admin Panel.

From the left menu, click on User Accounts, then select New Account.

Domain name: teo-en-ming.com

Username:

Password:

Admin Email:

Server IPs:

Package: Default

Reseller: Not checked

Inode: 0

Process limit: 40

Open files: 150

Backup user account: checked

Shell Access: Disabled by default for security reasons: Unchecked

AutoSSL: Domain must be pointed to the server: Unchecked

Click Create.

Setting Up New Email Account
============================

Login to CentOS Web Panel User Panel.

From the left menu, click Email Accounts, then click Email Accounts.

Click Add a New MailBox.

Email Address: ceo@teo-en-ming.com

Password:

Quota MB: 16000

Click Add.

Using Your New Email Account
============================

Login to Roundcube Webmail.

Click Settings.

From the left menu, click Identities, then click ceo@teo-en-ming.com

Display Name: Turritopsis Dohrnii Teo En Ming

Click Save.

Congratulations! You can now start using your new email account.






REFERENCES
==========

[1] https://lkml.org/lkml/2020/2/25/509

[2] http://lkml.iu.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/2002.3/02043.html

[3] https://marc.info/?l=linux-kernel&m=158263958532716&w=2

[4] http://lists.linuxfromscratch.org/pipermail/lfs-chat/2020-February/029097.html

[5] https://marc.info/?l=postfix-users&m=158264145200949&w=2

[6] https://marc.info/?l=qmail&m=158264284001458&w=2

[7] http://lists.kolab.org/pipermail/users/2020-February/021876.html

[8] https://www.mail-archive.com/server-user@james.apache.org/msg16259.html

[9] https://sourceforge.net/p/courier/mailman/message/36932325/

[10] https://sourceforge.net/p/squirrelmail/mailman/message/36932330/