docker-postfix

Simple Postfix SMTP TLS relay docker image with no local authentication enabled (to be run in a secure LAN).

It also includes rsyslog to enable logging to stdout.

Build instructions

Clone this repo and then:

cd docker-Postfix
sudo docker build -t postfix .

Or you can use the provided docker-compose files:

sudo docker-compose -f docker-compose.yml -f docker-compose.dev.yml build

For more information on using multiple compose files see here. You can also find a prebuilt docker image from Docker Hub, which can be pulled with this command:

sudo docker pull juanluisbaptiste/postfix:latest

How to run it

The following env variables need to be passed to the container:

• SMTP_SERVER Server address of the SMTP server to use.
• SMTP_PORT (Optional, Default value: 587) Port address of the SMTP server to use.
• SMTP_USERNAME Username to authenticate with.
• SMTP_PASSWORD Password of the SMTP user.
• SERVER_HOSTNAME Server hostname for the Postfix container. Emails will appear to come from the hostname's domain.

The following env variable(s) are optional.

• HEADER_TAG This will add a header for tracking messages upstream. Helpful for spam filters. Will appear as "RelayTag: ${HEADER_TAG}" in the email headers.

To use this container from anywhere, the 25 port needs to be exposed to the docker host server:

docker run -d --name postfix -p "25:25"  \ 
       -e SMTP_SERVER=smtp.bar.com \
       -e SMTP_USERNAME=foo@bar.com \
       -e SMTP_PASSWORD=XXXXXXXX \
       -e SERVER_HOSTNAME=helpdesk.mycompany.com \
       juanluisbaptiste/postfix

If you are going to use this container from other docker containers then it's better to just publish the port:

docker run -d --name postfix -P \
       -e SMTP_SERVER=smtp.bar.com \
       -e SMTP_USERNAME=foo@bar.com \
       -e SMTP_PASSWORD=XXXXXXXX \
       -e SERVER_HOSTNAME=helpdesk.mycompany.com \           
       juanluisbaptiste/postfix

Or if you can start the service using the provided docker-compose file for production use:

sudo docker-compose up -d

A note about using gmail as a relay

Gmail by default does not allow email clients that don't use OAUTH 2 for authentication (like Thunderbird or Outlook). First you need to enable access to "Less secure apps" on your google settings.

Also take into account that email From: header will contain the email address of the account being used to authenticate against the Gmail SMTP server(SMTP_USERNAME), the one on the email will be ignored by Gmail.

Debugging

If you need troubleshooting the container you can set the environment variable DEBUG=yes for a more verbose output.