When we consider the suitable Open Source Mail Server for a business organisation, it depends on many factors. Below are some factors that you might need include in your studies:
· A good track of security records
· Good performance under high load
· Hardware requirement
· Flexible to interact with databases in many formats
· Compatible to many SMTP variants in use
· Easy to customized
· Quality 3rd party plugins available
· Quality documentation is available
· Communities Support
Similar to Qmail MTA, Postfix is created by a modular design (similar to Qmail) rather than a monolithic design (such as Sendmail). This make Postfix to have various advantages or strength compared to Sendmail.
Below are some of reasons why some Email administrator prefer Postfix than other MTA system:
Flexibility
Due
to Modular Design, Administrator can pick and choose what module to be
activated. This feature not only just increase the performance but also
tighten the security of Mail Server.
Performance
Postfix
consumes less system resources than most other MTAs (or at least, with
standard configurations). The minimalist design of Postfix Mail Server
has make outstanding performance over many MTA.
Security
Postfix provides a better security than Sendmail. You can have a quick search on CERT Advisories and quickly turned up more than a dozen Sendmail incidents. The is because the services of Postfixis
NOT executed as root services. This make it is the entire Operating
System security more safer and harder to be compromised by hackers.
Another
reason that makes Postfix more secure is because Postfix is only allows
each process to use necessary rights to function, unnecessary rights
are eliminated.
Other
than that, Postfix Mail Server's processes are ONLY controlled and
initiated by master daemon. It eliminated the risk of using child
processes design when prompt to inter-process communication
exploitation.
Ease of Administration
As compare to Sendmail, the configuration files on Postfix are far more easier to be configured.
Support Use of Milters
Postfix
allow administrator to deploy 3rd party software to filter email from
Postfix Mail Server to anti-virus and anti-spam filters. Administrators
can integrate Postfix Mail Server with many quality 3rd party plugins.
Community Support and Documentations
There far more many community support forums, articles that share the knowledge of setting,performance tuning and troubleshooting of Postfix as compare to other Open Source mail servers.
