How to Install Gray Duck Mail on OpenBSD

Gray Duck Mail is a free and open-source email service developed by Gray Duck Technology. This guide will show you how to install Gray Duck Mail on an OpenBSD system.

Prerequisites

Before installing Gray Duck Mail on OpenBSD, you need to have the following:

  • OpenBSD 6.9 or later
  • 2 GB of RAM or more
  • 20 GB of disk space or more
  • Access to the root user account or a user account with sudo privileges

Step 1: Install Required Packages

To install Gray Duck Mail, you need to install some prerequisite packages.

To install the packages, open a terminal and run the following command:

sudo pkg_add ghc cabal-install postgresql postgresql-server

Step 2: Set Up PostgreSQL Database and User

Gray Duck Mail uses PostgreSQL as its backend database. Before we can install Gray Duck Mail, we need to set up a PostgreSQL database and user.

To do this, run the following commands:

sudo -u _postgresql initdb -D /var/postgresql/data
sudo rcctl enable postgresql && sudo rcctl start postgresql
sudo -u postgres createuser grayduckuser
sudo -u postgres createdb grayduckmail --owner grayduckuser

Step 3: Install Gray Duck Mail

Now that we have all the prerequisites installed, we can install Gray Duck Mail.

To install Gray Duck Mail, run the following commands:

git clone https://github.com/grayduckmail/grayduck.git
cd grayduck
cabal install

Step 4: Configure Gray Duck Mail

After installing Gray Duck Mail, we need to configure it.

First, create a configuration file by running the following command:

sudo cp grayduck-example.env /usr/local/etc/grayduck.env

Next, open the configuration file in a text editor and make the necessary changes. 

sudo vi /usr/local/etc/grayduck.env

You will need to update the following settings:

  • GRAY_DUCK_DB_PATH: Set this to grayduckuser@localhost/grayduckmail

  • GRAY_DUCK_DB_USERNAME: Set this to grayduckuser

  • GRAY_DUCK_DB_PASSWORD: Set this to the password for the grayduckuser account you created earlier.

Step 5: Start Gray Duck Mail

Now that Gray Duck Mail is installed and configured, you can start it by running the following command:

cd grayduck
./dist/build/grayduck/grayduck

Conclusion

You have successfully installed and configured Gray Duck Mail on OpenBSD. You can now send and receive emails using your newly installed mail server.