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Haraka - a Node.js Mail Server

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Haraka is a highly scalable node.js email server with a modular plugin architecture. Haraka can serve thousands of concurrent connections and deliver thousands of messages per second. Haraka and plugins are written in asynchronous JS and are very fast.

Haraka has very good spam protection (see plugins) and works well as a filtering MTA. It also works well as a MSA running on port 587 with auth and dkim_sign plugins enabled.

Haraka makes no attempt to be a mail store (like Exchange or Postfix/Exim/Qmail), a LDA, nor an IMAP server (like Dovecot or Courier). Haraka is typically used with such systems.

Haraka has a scalable outbound mail delivery engine built in. Mail marked as relaying (such as via an auth plugin) is automatically queued for outbound delivery.

Getting Help

Screencast

Getting started with Haraka

Why Use Haraka?

Haraka's plugin architecture provides an easily extensible MTA that complements traditional MTAs that excel at managing mail stores but do not have sufficient filtering.

The plugin system makes it easy to code new features. A typical example is providing qmail-like extended addresses to an Exchange system, whereby you could receive mail as user-anyword@domain.com, and yet still have it correctly routed to user@domain.com. This is a few lines of code in Haraka.

Plugins are provided for running mail through SpamAssassin, validating HELO names, checking DNS Blocklists, and many others.

Installing Haraka

Haraka requires node.js to run. Install Haraka with npm:

# If the second command gives "nobody" errors, uncomment & run the next command
# npm -g config set user root
npm install -g Haraka

After installation, use the haraka binary to set up the service.

Running Haraka

First, create the service:

haraka -i /path/to/haraka_test

That creates the directory haraka_test with config and plugin directories within. It also sets the host name used by Haraka to the output of hostname.

If hostname is not correct, edit config/host_list. For example, to receive mail addressed to user@domain.com, add domain.com to the config/host_list file.

Finally, start Haraka using root permissions:

haraka -c /path/to/haraka_test

And it will run.

Configure Haraka

To choose which plugins run, edit config/plugins. Plugins control the overall behaviour of Haraka. By default, only messages to domains listed in config/host_list will be accepted and then delivered via the smtp-forward plugin. Configure the destination in config/smtp_forward.ini.

Read the Fine Manual

haraka -h plugins/$name

The docs detail how each plugin is configured. After editing config/plugins, restart Haraka and enjoy!

Running from git

If you are unable to use npm to install Haraka, you can run from git by following these steps:

First clone the repository:

$ git clone https://github.com/haraka/Haraka.git
$ cd Haraka

Install Haraka's node.js dependencies locally:

$ npm install

Edit config/plugins and config/smtp.ini to specify the plugins and config you want.

Finally run Haraka:

$ node haraka.js

License and Author

Haraka is MIT licensed - see the LICENSE file for details.

Haraka is a project started by Matt Sergeant, a 10 year veteran of the email and anti-spam world. Previous projects have been the project leader for SpamAssassin and a hacker on Qpsmtpd.