Email server needed, and "Catch All" accounts

I have been using Thunderbird for decades ( or so) I want to keep using it.

Also have had Go Daddy for almost as long.
From the beginning, I Always used a "Catch All" account.
It alerted me to people ( I have Never met) using my site, and identity.

At the trade shows, i always used a new email address.
So,
IMTS 2016 I used [email protected]
IMTS 2018 I used [email protected] etc.

Propane company got [email protected] etc...

This worked Great! ever since i started.
Easy to sort incoming mail, and I knew where spammers were getting my email address from.

Been doing this for so long, no way to know how many addresses I have had out there.

Was I doing it all wrong?

GoDaddy shut of the ability to have anything Close to a Catch All account.
And does not have a way to get to tech support.
I can get to Tech support, as soon as I ask about email hosting....

They put me on hold to "The Transition Team"
After three hours on hold the batteries in the phone go dead.
Over 10 hours and absolutely cannot get through to support. Really starting to Hate the evil bastards.
Plus they shut off the email addresses they use to communicate with me...

Next called the ISP. My account should include email hosting.
They did not seem to understand the idea or need for a Catch All account.

So....Best way forward? Good, Reliable email server (pick any none)

Was I doing that wrong?

Thanks in advance..

3t3d said:

I have been using Thunderbird for decades ( or so) I want to keep using it.

Also have had Go Daddy for almost as long.
From the beginning, I Always used a "Catch All" account.
It alerted me to people ( I have Never met) using my site, and identity.

At the trade shows, i always used a new email address.
So,
IMTS 2016 I used [email protected]
IMTS 2018 I used [email protected] etc.

Propane company got [email protected] etc...

This worked Great! ever since i started.
Easy to sort incoming mail, and I knew where spammers were getting my email address from.

Been doing this for so long, no way to know how many addresses I have had out there.

Was I doing it all wrong?

GoDaddy shut of the ability to have anything Close to a Catch All account.
And does not have a way to get to tech support.
I can get to Tech support, as soon as I ask about email hosting....

They put me on hold to "The Transition Team"
After three hours on hold the batteries in the phone go dead.
Over 10 hours and absolutely cannot get through to support. Really starting to Hate the evil bastards.
Plus they shut off the email addresses they use to communicate with me...

Next called the ISP. My account should include email hosting.
They did not seem to understand the idea or need for a Catch All account.

So....Best way forward? Good, Reliable email server (pick any none)

Was I doing that wrong?

Thanks in advance..

Click to expand...

yes and no to the question of doing it wrong.
just like machining there are many ways to do something.

your use of new accounts for shows is a good idea.

The accounting could / should have gone to accounts payable, accounts receivable, sales, etc for business.

it makes it easier when you grow and add employees. But that's just another way of doing things.

I create different address books in thunderbird. Then I build filters based on address books. So I don't have to keep changing the filters.. Just have the mail goto different folders based on which address book the name is in. Works great, but I also use subject filters for some too.

it makes it easier. For years thunderbird did things much better than others, but the past few years they are going the wrong direction, making themselves more like Microshit... much more buggy too. if it keeps up, I'll be finding another option. I liked the way they were NOT like MS...

The filters and folders are powerful. You can set up so many different methods of moving mail around automatically.
if you need more info, pm me and I'll explain different options... there's no right one answer, just a lot of different ways of doing it.

Thanks Woodchuck.
The problem is that GoDaddy, and my ISP shut off and no longer support Catch All accounts.

I liked the way Thunderbird was working for me..

Web.com will. You can have 100 or so acccounts by default, you can direct any number of them to be forwarded to one or several accounts, and any emails to your .url with incorrect names will be forwarded where you specify. And web.com 's basic service is inexpensive. Last time I needed tech support I got it no problem.

I have a half dozen accounts, spam filters are good enough that even the ones out there on the web don't get more email than I can parse in a day.

Even the one that has been on my website for 20+ years got fewer than 20 emails today. My actual personal email gets virtually zero spam. Accounts with no leakage, like an email that is for one customers orders, get zero spam

So setup an info@ or owner@ or trashbin@ and you will be fine

Also using thunderbird for 20 some years

3t3d said:

Thanks Woodchuck.
The problem is that GoDaddy, and my ISP shut off and no longer support Catch All accounts.

Click to expand...

So it took them full 40 years to "get the message" we SMTP devels had been BEATING them over the HEAD with? That "catch-all" accounts encourage massive volumes of randomized-address bot-spam?

But "get it" they finally DID? Will WONDERS never CEASE!!!

Don't look for it to come BACK! THEIR servers get blacklisted!!!

As they HAD BEEN!!!

What you are MEANT to do is have "only" such bespoke/disposable addresses as you specifically create to be valid ones as the server can look-up.

It isn't "rocket science at all! "SIMPLE Mail Transfer Protocol" means exactly what it SAYS it means. SIMPLE. Thanks to the immortal memory of Jon Postel. And a host of others.

Extract:

After a successful MAIL command, the sender issues a series of RCPT commands that identify recipients of the mail message. The receiver will then acknowledge each RCPT command by sending "250" (OK) or by sending the error message "550" (No such user here).

Need more? it's widely published, 1981 onward.

Here's a simple recap:

Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) - How SMTP works?

You get the same benefit as you have BEEN getting.

The MTA operator gets to reject the "no such account" randomized spambot junk right up front, during the uber-frugal LOW bandwidth initial handshakes. As above. "RCPT" handshake. I can send only "550". Three friggin' bytes.

The SENDING serve adds "No such user" or "No such Account". Locally to itself. No bandwidth waste required.

AND neither server need further suffer ANY of the time, bandwidth, CPU cycles, R/W I/O and storage space WASTE ... for real money... that is entailed once reaching the "SMTP DATA" phase. When the BODY of a message.. and any attachments.. actually transfer over the "wire".

Catch up in the back!

You can still have flexible DIY addresses.

Just on-purpose, not by accident of omission.

For extra credit?

Ask an SMTP guru - on-purpose. Instead of a gang of Machinists. By accident.

Pure accident it is if you find a few that are both. Damned few.

3t3d said:

I have been using Thunderbird for decades ( or so) I want to keep using it.

Click to expand...

I'm a little confused because Thunderbird is a client, not a server. Personally, I like Ishmail. Can't beat the name

I can't really understand what you are trying to say, because you don't add users just at the client level, you have to add them to the server(s) as well.

I'll go out on a limb and guess that when you added a user to your Thunderbird, GoDaddy was also adding that user to the mail server that you use ? Which they supplied ?

I ran our own mail servers for many years - there were several that are straightforward to set up and easy to maintain and secure. But some years ago it got to be impossible - no matter how many hoops you jumped through on your domain records, many mail administrators would shitcan traffic that was from anything but one of the Big Names. I guess it was easier than actually doing their jobs. Getting whitelisted at every ISP in the country was too discouraging.

Currently, I think you'll have to either use a place that specializes in mail (protonmail ?) or you can run your own mail servers but route them through google. Yeah. Sucks. Running your own independently is now a lot of grief.

I'd like to ask Mr Berners-Lee what he thinks of the state of the internet these days ....

(btw, gmail still works with pop and smtp and even imap so no need to ditch Thunderbird. It just takes some extra work, but anything is better than their ghastly web interface.)

EmanuelGoldstein said:

..no matter how many hoops you jumped through on your domain records, many mail administrators would shitcan traffic that was from anything but one of the Big Names. I guess it was easier than actually doing their jobs. Getting whitelisted at every ISP in the country was too discouraging.

Click to expand...

Horse manure. "A LITTLE knowledge .. is only good for making lame excuses.."

Safe bet you were yet-another shallow half-vast implementor claiming SMTP does not require a fixed-IP PTR GRANTED to you by the link provider?

True as far as it goes.

But BIND does. And as a public-facing service? SMTP must obey BIND.

A "properly associated" PTR can be matched to the arriving IP?

We accept the "CONNECT".

ELSE NOT.

See Exim MTA code: "hosts.c" for how hard we try to "find a way" for any "legitimate" submitter.

Mind.. you still have to get the REST of the protocol right.. AFTER allowed onto the teat.

But rejecting no-PTR in the first milliseconds of the initial SMTP CONNECT?

Reliably eliminates 89 percent - multi-decade, dozen-plus MTA average - of all arriving botnet spam.

Compromised Winboxen in their billions do not HAVE PTR records that can BE associated.

Neither did the Royal St. Andrews Golf Club.. or thousands of other entities that SHOULD HAVE known better. And WOULD have.. had they but engaged Unix Wizards.. instead of anarchistic penguinistas and win-weenies.

"Oh, it's all volunteer and we can do as we please!"

Not quite.

When an "RFC" gels?

It is under the oversight of the ITU.

And the International Telecommunications Union (formerly "CCITT") is a TREATY organization. United Nations level, even.

Force of Law. Amongst Sovereign National Governments.
Not just a few. Essentially ALL of them on the Planet!

About ITU

Not really your FIRST choice of folk to defy?

Unless you WANT to be isolated from communications? All of them.

RTFM. Implement your MX correctly. Your traffic is accepted. ELSE NOT.

World is too big and too fast-changing by half to try to "whitelist" even one millionth part of it and not be out-of-date all the time.

BIND exists. Use it. Properly.

thermite said:

Horse manure.

Safe bet you were yet-another claiming SMTP does not require a PTR.

Click to expand...

You'd probably be helpful if I had a question about crossing the continent in a Conestoga wagon. But nowadays you are nothing but an historic relic.

No matter what is in your domain records, many ISP's shitcan mail from independent mail servers. It's the SPF records you would be thinking of, if you had been involved after, say, 1990 : and it doesn't matter whether you have all the records correct or not, many places kick you if you aren't yahoo google mickey or in that category. Alaska.net is one I remember specifically because the guy was such a bozo, but it's very common. And very much a pain in the rear.

Running a little mail server for your company directly on them innertubes these days is a pain in the patootie.

But next time I have a question about running a Sinclair ZX I'll be sure to ask you.

EmanuelGoldstein said:

You'd probably be helpful

Click to expand...

It isn't POSSIBLE to "help" a troll.

Only to point out that he is an ignorant fool. Your are out of your comfort zone and into MY wheelhouse on SMTP.

A motorcycle-parts maker lecturing a telecoms guru and many-MTA developer .. in the record? Five different MTA?

It isn't even comical!

Somewhere I even have a personal code contribution to hosts.c. specifically.
A logging enhancement. BFD. "Many hands, many eyes", and F/LOSS progress marches on.

Can you even FIND a c code source file?

Let alone understand it?

Stick to what you know. And I'll not lecture YOU on alloy wheels!

Yet.

3t3d said:

I have been using Thunderbird for decades ( or so) I want to keep using it.

Also have had Go Daddy for almost as long.
From the beginning, I Always used a "Catch All" account.
It alerted me to people ( I have Never met) using my site, and identity.

Click to expand...

Namecheap.com offers email service like you're looking for. I use it with my accounts, and use Thunderbird. The only issue I have with it is: Sometime sending an email times out when sending from Thunderbird. It never did that across any of the cell phones I've used with their servers, just Thunderbird. Sometimes I have to hit send 5 times before it finally goes. Usually it goes on the first try though.

adamm said:

Namecheap.com offers email service like you're looking for. I use it with my accounts, and use Thunderbird. The only issue I have with it is: Sometime sending an email times out when sending from Thunderbird. It never did that across any of the cell phones I've used with their servers, just Thunderbird. Sometimes I have to hit send 5 times before it finally goes. Usually it goes on the first try though.

Click to expand...

Yep, NameCheap's PrivateEmail service can do this.

adamm said:

Namecheap.com offers email service like you're looking for.

Click to expand...

You are saying that Namecheap's mail servers will accept email to any random name @yourdomain.com ?

Eeeuw.

3t, you really shouldn't be doing this ....

Some mail servers allow a + to be added to a username to give much the same effect. So if your email is
[email protected], [email protected] will also go to that same mailbox, but the email client (Thunderbird) can filter on the +filter part to sort mail into different folders. This may help you get the same end result.

Fairly simple to test, just put a +blah at the end of your username and send yourself an email.

rabler said:

Some mail servers allow a + to be added to a username to give much the same effect. So if your email is
[email protected], [email protected] will also go to that same mailbox, but the email client (Thunderbird) can filter on the +filter part to sort mail into different folders. This may help you get the same end result.

Fairly simple to test, just put a +blah at the end of your username and send yourself an email.

Click to expand...

My "hired" one is the other way 'round:

One could do:

IMTS2000@sales.<example>.<net>

IMTS2020@sales.<example>.<net>

Note the extra "dot" and the "@" shifted one element to the left?

That sort of structure (more than one style is supported) has to work with potentially ANY other MTA on-planet. Not just the end-luser's mail host.

So the Wizard doing the server configuration needs to be aware of what will or will not work (it is all documented) and work "everywhere". not just on his OWN server as it parses RCPT phase info.

At least a substring having to be a valid user, not random, it works well-enough.