Best way to migrate email server?

[mynameisjuan]

So at the place I work we have this old Centos 5.x server using Courier and roundcube I think. The server hasnt been touched since 2005 but is still up and running. This is a problem however since now no ones knows all the workings around the custom script that just doesnt work with modern software. 

 

I want to convert over to Mailcow. I like the admin panel and the interface for simple management.

 

Any suggestions on converting the database and mail files over to Mailcow.

[jde3]

Very difficult if you don't know what your doing but IMAP could do export/import. 

 

I went through this once with a Dovecot to Zimbra implementation, was a major brain transplant operation and took weeks of planning.

 

The shame here is I don't quite remember the process but I believe we just scripted the output of one into the other and stood around for 20 hours drinking coffee praying it wouldn't go boom.

 

Edit: I've never heard of mailcow before and in looking into it it appears to just be a fronted for dovecot and postfix (this is "modern software" ..?)

[MysticalGnome]

If you have to migrate an IMAP server I would go for imapsync, this should get you going.

https://www.howtoforge.com/how-to-migrate-mailboxes-between-imap-servers-with-imapsync

Based on my experience if you have a fast disk array in both mailservers than it should copy pretty quickly.

[derr12]

if The mailbox formats are compatable, you can rsync the folders. If they aren’t then imap is about the best way to go.

[mynameisjuan]

On 4/18/2018 at 1:41 AM, jde3 said:

Very difficult if you don't know what your doing but IMAP could do export/import. 

 

I went through this once with a Dovecot to Zimbra implementation, was a major brain transplant operation and took weeks of planning.

 

The shame here is I don't quite remember the process but I believe we just scripted the output of one into the other and stood around for 20 hours drinking coffee praying it wouldn't go boom.

 

Edit: I've never heard of mailcow before and in looking into it it appears to just be a fronted for dovecot and postfix (this is "modern software" ..?)

Yeah current server uses courier instead of dovecot, but IMAP none the less. 

 

Mailcow, from what I can find, is pretty popular apparently in self hosting. It has a beautiful GUI and has every admin panel setting you need. Also support pluggins. 

On 4/18/2018 at 11:53 AM, MysticalGnome said:

If you have to migrate an IMAP server I would go for imapsync, this should get you going.

https://www.howtoforge.com/how-to-migrate-mailboxes-between-imap-servers-with-imapsync

Based on my experience if you have a fast disk array in both mailservers than it should copy pretty quickly.

I did look at imapsync but it looks like I need the passwords to do it. This server is for customers and there are 7,000 mailboxes needed to be transferred. Imapsync would take just too long to manually type in that info and I cannot retrieve the passwords. 

15 hours ago, derr12 said:

if The mailbox formats are compatable, you can rsync the folders. If they aren’t then imap is about the best way to go.

I did do an rsync already as the folder structures are the same. The database on the other hand is not and where the transfer has hit a wall. 

[Sir Asvald]

Is mailcow your only option? Not sure if Exchange will be an option for you. 

[mynameisjuan]

4 minutes ago, Abdul201588 said:

Is mailcow your only option? Not sure if Exchange will be an option for you. 

An exchange server cost somewhere around $3-5 per user. Thats $21,000-35,000 per month. 

[Sir Asvald]

Just now, mynameisjuan said:

An exchange server cost somewhere around $3-5 per user. Thats $21,000-35,000 per month. 

That's if you're renting a mailbox. Why not buy a license?

 

Take a look at this:

 

https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/cloud-platform/windows-server-pricing

[mynameisjuan]

14 minutes ago, Abdul201588 said:

That's if you're renting a mailbox. Why not buy a license?

 

Take a look at this:

 

https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/cloud-platform/windows-server-pricing

Hmmmm...core based too. 

 

I can provide this to my boss but seeing how cheap they are, I highly doubt it would go. 

[Sir Asvald]

2 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

Hmmmm...core based too. 

 

I can provide this to my boss but seeing how cheap they are, I highly doubt it would go. 

My mistake. That is for Windows server. Not Exchange. Take a look at Exchange 2013. 

[leadeater]

16 hours ago, mynameisjuan said:

Hmmmm...core based too. 

 

I can provide this to my boss but seeing how cheap they are, I highly doubt it would go. 

Doesn't solve the migration problem though.

 

Maybe these might help?

https://docs.roundcube.net/doc/help/1.0/en_US/mail/importexport.html

https://serverfault.com/questions/639982/migrating-messages-from-an-old-mailserver-to-a-new-courier/639994#639994

http://www.laurencejackson.com/Courex/index.html?exporting_to_emlmbox_files.htm

https://gist.github.com/pklaus/962261

https://wiki.dovecot.org/Migration/Courier

http://batleth.sapienti-sat.org/projects/mb2md/

 

Sounds like a horrible job and I'm glad I'm not doing it, good luck.

[mynameisjuan]

1 hour ago, leadeater said:

Sounds like a horrible job and I'm glad I'm not doing it, good luck.

Yeah its miserable because the old mail server had a custom script because roundcube only supports 1 domain. 

 

But thanks for the links and I will dig through them today for sure!!

[jde3]

On 4/19/2018 at 9:21 AM, Abdul201588 said:

Is mailcow your only option? Not sure if Exchange will be an option for you. 

I mentioned Zimbra before.. I've used it in a corporate environment with ~500 users. It's reliable, not too bad to work on and it dosen't lock you into a platform.

 

Other stuff might exist now but this was a solid option and I wouldn't hesitate to look at it if I needed to implement something.