Mercury Mail Installation and Configuration Guide
for NetWare 4.x/5.x
Introduction to Mercury Mail
Mercury Mail, written by David Harris of New Zealand, is a mail
transport system designed to work with Pegasus Mail and other compatible mail
clients. It allows the transmission and receipt of mail from the Internet for
all users on a NetWare file server without the addition of any extra software
on individual workstations.
Mercury provides a complete Simple Mail Transport Protocol (SMTP)
client and server implementation, which uses the NetWare TCP/IP stack provided
with NetWare 3.x, 4.x or 5.x. It also includes a comprehensive mail server that
can handle automatic mailing list management, file transmission, user verification
and more.
Mercury is freeware — and you may install it on as many
servers as you wish without obligation or cost. Mercury Mail manuals are optionally
available from Mercury at very reasonable prices, but there is absolutely no requirement
to purchase them.
Purchasing any manual license permits access to technical support.
Once you receive your manual and license, you can send queries to tech-support@pmail.gen.nz
(make sure you include your license number in the message's subject line for assistance).
System Requirements for Mercury Mail
Mercury requires NetWare 3.x, 4.x, or 5.x with the NetWare TCP/IP
transport module loaded and correctly installed. Mercury Mail is not fussy about
details of the TCP/IP settings, provided the transport is running. In normal use,
Mercury will take approximately 70 KB of server RAM and 2 BSD sockets and should
not significantly slow the performance of the server. Versions of Mercury are
provided for both NDS and Bindery mode operation.
A version of Mercury Mail server for the 32-bit Windows platforms
such as Windows NT and Windows 95 is available. Please refer to the Install and
Configuration Guide for Mercury/32 for more information.
Note to Netware 3.x users: This documentation provides
instructions to implement Mercury Mail in NDS mode available only on servers running
Novell NetWare 4.x and 5.x only. MOREnet does not provide support for Netware
3.x at this time. Any installation of Mercury Mail under Netware 3 must get support
from the Mercury Mail mailing list at http://www.pmail.com/support.htm.
Note to NetWare 5.1 and NetWare 6.0 users: There are
reported problems when current version Mecury Mail version 1.48 install on NetWare
5.1 (with SP5) and NetWare 6.0 (with SP2). Since Mercury Mail is released before
the current version of support patches or NetWare 6.0 operating system, it is
likely they are not compatible. The current version of Mercury Mail v1.48 has
not been updated since 1999 and it is likely this is the last version of NLM release
for Mercury Mail. It is recommended that you do NOT run Mercury Mail on any NetWare
version 5.1 or 6.0 or above. This documentation is provided as is and MOREnet
does not provide any support for platform higher than the stated required operating
systems.
Prerequisites for Mercury Mail Installation on Novell
NetWare 4.x/5.x
Before installing Mercury Mail on a Novell NetWare server, complete
the following tasks:
Assign an unused IP address that is allocated to your organization on the server.
If you need assistance on how to configure TCP/IP with an IP address on your server,
refer to the MOREnet document Installing TCP/IP Services on Novell NetWare Servers
at http://www.more.net/technical/netserv/unsupported/nw3x4x/nw312-41install-tcpip.html.
Your organization must have a registered Internet domain name assigned. An
Internet domain name provides global directory naming to support network services
such as e-mail, FTP and the World Wide Web. A server providing these services
must be registered with an Internet Domain Name Server (DNS). MOREnet provides
domain name registration to all customers. For instructions on how to register
domain names, refer to the MOREnet Domain Name Services website at http://www.more.net/services/dns/index.html.
IMPORTANT: Mercury Mail requires a smart SMTP server for outgoing e-mail.
It does not deliver directly to the external users. If you do not have an SMTP
server (for example, UNIX, NT or other SMTP servers), please download and read
the MOREnet document Configure a smart SMTP relay host (end-to-end delivery) at
http://www.more.net/technical/netserv/servers/novell/mercurymail/smartrelay.pdf.
You must install and configure this SMTP server before installing Mercury Mail.
The smart SMTP server and Mercury Mail cannot reside on the same server.
Mercury Mail Download Site
The latest version of Mercury Mail can be downloaded at the
official Pegasus Mail/Mercury Mail Site.
Mercury Mail Installation and Configuration Procedures
for Novell NetWare 4.x/5.x Network
Log in to the network with a user ID that has administrator privilege.
Make a temporary directory on the hard drive (for example, C:\TEMP).
Download the zipped Mercury file or the self-extracting file into the temporary
directory on the hard drive.
Unzip mercury.zip (or run the self-extracting file) to a temporary directory
(for example, C:\MERCURY).
Run the setup program (setup.exe) from the directory where Mercury has been
extracted. The Mercury setup program is a DOS utility. You may notice a DOS prompt
window on your Windows operating system.
Read the online information screen and press Y to continue the installation.
Read the new installation or upgrade information screen. If this is a new installation,
press I to continue. Otherwise, press U to upgrade an existing installation. If
you are upgrading from a previous version, skip the next step and go to step 9.
Read the Mercury Operating Mode option information. Press N to select native
NDS mode.
Confirm on the correct server for installation and press Y to continue.
Note: If you have more than one server on your network (multiple containers)
and are authenticated to more than one server, press ESC to back out to DOS, then
run the setup.exe program with the SETUP <server name> command line parameter.
Mercury Mail copies the required program files (NLMs) to the SYSTEM directory.
Press ENTER to continue. If you are upgrading from a previous version of Mercury
Mail, skip ahead to step 15.
At the Creating Mail Queue screen, press Y to allow Mercury Mail to create
a mail queue area on your server. The default name is SMTPMAIL on the root
directory on SYS volume. The installation program will grant the appropriate rights
to the SMTPMAIL directory. Press ENTER to continue.
The next screen prompts you to create the MERCURY.INI file. Press C to create
the MERCURY.INI file as suggested. Press ENTER to continue the installation.
At the Creating MERCURY.INI configuration file screen, enter the information
requested:
Enter your Internet domain name. This is the name you have registered for your
organization. For more information about registering a domain name, refer to the
section "Registering your Domain name with MOREnet".
Enter the user ID as the postmaster for your domain using Novell NDS naming
conventions. The purpose of the postmaster user ID is to handle all administrative
tasks and e-mail delivery errors.
Example: If your Novell user ID is JDOE and the container name
is HIGHSCHOOL, then the address of the postmaster for the domain is JDOE.HIGHSCHOOL.
Any name entered here is relative to the [root] object in your NDS tree. If you
have a user ID object inside of an organization unit (.OU) container, and the
container is also inside the organization (.O) container, you must use the following
syntax:
<userid>.<organization unit>.<organization>
Enter the time zone, relative to the Universal Standard Time (GMT). The UTC
time for Central Zone in the U.S. is -0600.
Enter the IP address of the SMTP relay address. Mercury Mail for Novell requires
a smart SMTP mail relay server. If you do not have an SMTP relay server and wish
to know how to set one up, go to page 2, item 3 of this document for more information.
Press N at the LDAP Server prompt screen. Press Y for LDAP service if you have
installed LDAP server for Novell or have installed NDS Enabler from Pegasus Mail
(wpmnds20.zip).
Press ENTER to continue the installation.
At the Modifying AUTOEXEC.NCF screen, press C to let the installation
program create a SYS:SYSTEM/MERCURY.NCF file on your server. The MERCURY.NCF batch
file is a text file, which contains the following lines:
Note: Mercury Mail can automatically load itself every time the server
restarts. To do this, add the MERCURY.NCF line in the AUTOEXEC.NCF file (SYS:SYSTEM).
The Mercury modules must be loaded after TCP/IP is initialized. Make sure MERCURY.NCF
is inserted only after the TCP/IP initialization statements in AUTOEXEC.NCF. To
be safe, put MERCURY.NCF at the very end of the AUTOEXEC.NCF file.
Example of content of a typical AUTOEXEC.NCF file
..
MOUNT ALL
SEARCH ADD SYS:\JAVA\NWGFX
# Below is the batch file to load Mercury Mail
MERCURY.NCF
The installation finishes and returns you to the DOS prompt.
You may also optionally create another NCF batch file to quickly unload Mercury
modules at the server console for troubleshooting purposes.
Example: Create an UNMERCUR.NCF text file which contains:
When Mercury loads, it will ask you to authenticate with the user ID and password
of a privileged account. Mercury Mail uses this account to deliver e-mail to all
your users. You need to type in the user ID that has the supervisor privilege
and you must use the Novell NDS naming convention of your user ID, expressed relative
to the root of the NDS tree.
Example:
Admin.Staff.ABC-School
EricB.Staff.ABC-School
If you have successfully entered in the proper user ID and password, Mercury
will display
Performing NDS mode startup...OK.
At the server console, toggle (press ALT+ESC) to the next Mercury screen, and
do the same thing (authenticate with user ID and password). There are four Mercury
screens, but only three Mercury screens ask you for the user ID and password.
If you make a mistake while entering the proper user ID and password, the Mercury
screen will report an error and unload itself from the server. You may manually
load the Mercury modules at the console prompt and try again.
Configure Mercury Mail to Load Without Prompting for
User ID and Password Login
You may also configure Mercury Mail to automatically load without prompting
you for a user ID and password every time the server restarts. You need to type
in the user ID and password in the MERCURY.INI file.
To accomplish this, edit the MERCURY.INI file in SYS:SYSTEM directory
Look for the section lines which reads:
# [NDS]
# UserID : Admin.pmail
Remove the # signs and type in the user ID (in NDS context format) and password
for your server:
UserID : admin.morenet
Password : secretpassword
Note: Do not leave any blank spaces on the left side of user ID and
password. User ID and password must be on the left most side of the text. Spaces
between the : (colon) separating the fields and values are acceptable.
Normally, you would use the user admin as the login user ID. If you choose
not to use the admin user ID, you can also create another user ID solely for the
usage to login to NDS for mercury mail processing. The account Mercury uses must
have sufficient privilege to perform the following tasks:
Scan, create, read, rename and delete files in every user's new mailbox directory
Read the "home directory" attribute for every mail user to which
it might be called upon to deliver mail.
Search the NDS tree (that is, have Browse and Read rights) in all contexts
in which it might operate
Read all members of any group to which it may be called upon to deliver mail
If running in automaintenance mode, it must be able to add and delete NDS
attributes for any user to which it may deliver mail, and create and delete ACLs
on any mail user's home directory NDS attribute.
Note: The above list is an excerpt from the Mercury.ini help text under
the section [Netware 4.1 user information]
Configure Mercury Mail to Control SMTP Relay
Mercury mail version 1.4x and above supports SMTP relay control
which prohibits third-party e-mail servers or clients from using your Mercury
Mail server. This feature protects your mail server from being used by unauthorized
users or spammers to illegally send unsolicited junk mail to other Internet users.
All Mercury Mail administrators who are using the NLM version of Mercury Mail
are encouraged to enable the Mercury Mail relay control with at least the minimal
control. To enable the relay control mechanism, to the following:
Unload all your Mercury Mail modules (run UNMERCUR.NCF if you have created
this batch unload file).
Manually edit the MERCURY.INI file in SYS:SYSTEM directory (using a text editor),
and go to the [MercuryS] section of the file. The # sign on the left side indicates
the entire command line is commented or remarked out. To enable a command, remove
the # sign.
[MercuryS]
switch: 2
debug: 1 #
Whether or not to show session progress relay: 0 #
Turn off third-party relay
strict_relay: 1 # Turns
on strict relaying controls
allow: nnn.nnn.nnn.nnn #
A machine we WILL permit to connect # refuse: xxx.xxx.xxx.0 #
A group of machines we WON'T permit.
# logfile: SERVER/SYS:SYSTEM/MERCURY/MERCURYS.LOG
# size: 1500000 #
Maximum message size to accept
# session_logging : SYS:SYSTEM/MERCURY/LOG
# killfile: SYS:SYSTEM/MERCURY/MERCURYS.KFL # Never accept mail from here
# smtp_auth: 1 # Turn on authenticated SMTP support
# auth_file: sys:system/mercury/auth.mer # Username/Password file for AUTH
Note: Substitute nnn.nnn.nnn.nnn with your IP network
number.
Examples:
allow: 192.168.1.0 # includes IP range 192.168.1.1 to 192.168.1.254
If you have multiple IP subnets, you have to enter multiple allow: lines
allow: 192.168.2.0 # includes IP range 192.168.2.1 to 192.168.2.254
allow: 192.168.3.0 # includes IP range 192.168.3.1 to 192.168.3.254
Save the MERCURY.INI file.
Go to the server console and load all the Mercury Mail modules (run MERCURY.NCF
at prompt).
