[K12OSN] /spool/mail question

[Julius Szelagiewicz]

> This isn't LTSP specific -- but is there a proper way (or a reason NOT
> to) to use NFS to export the /var/spool/mail directory from my email
> server to all my LTSP servers?  It would make email programs a lot
> easier to set up, since "local mail" would literally be the actual email
> system mail.
>
> I'm not sure what happens with someone on machine1 sends local mail to
> username1 at the same time that username1 gets a *real* email on the
> email server.  Does NFS locking work in this case?
>
> I obviously don't want to break email -- but if all the computers shared
> a common /var/spool/mail, it would add some convienience.
>
> Anyone doing this?  Is this a common thing in *nix systems?  Is this an
> insane idea?
>
> Thanks a bunch,
> -Shawn
Shawn,
 theoretically it sounds like a good idea, practically it is not. first,
nfs locking is advisory, that is several processes writing to the same
file are apt to destroy it, and mail resides in *one* file. if you want a
central repository, select a machine that will carry all the mail (not
necessary the same as mail server), run imapd on it and use a webmail
setup. this allows you access to mail from just about anywhere and all
the mail sits on one machine (this machine needs to have all the user
accounts). this setup is pretty straightforward and it works well. julius