[vexim] vexim + SA + DSPAM

[Yan Seiner]

Odhiambo Washington wrote:
> On Sun, Dec 7, 2008 at 6:41 PM, Yan Seiner <yan at seiner.com 
> <mailto:yan at seiner.com>> wrote:
>
>     I have a shiny new installation of vexim.  Works like a charm.
>      Now I'm
>     trying to get similar functionality as with my 'real' accounts.  I
>     handle spam in the following way:
>
>     After the usual checks, mail passes through SA.  SA simply tags it as
>     spam in the headers; it doesn't modify the subject or anything else.
>
>     The message is then passed through dspam.  Dspam examines the
>     headers as
>     well.  It uses the SA results and tags the message as [SPAM] in the
>     subject along with adding its own results in the headers.
>
>     Lastly, exim, through the .forward filter, sorts the mail into the
>     Junk
>     folder.
>
>     It sounds complicated but it works; and it accurately handles perhaps
>     99.7% of spam, with only one false positive in the last 6 months.
>
>     I found this ( you have to scroll down to the vexim/dspam discusison)
>     but the vexim archives seem to be down:
>
>     http://www.exim-users.org/forums/showthread.php?t=52356
>
>     How do I go about setting up a system like I have with vexim?
>
>
> You can setup vexim with DSPAM but when it comes to the .forward 
> filter, It's gonna be complicated (for me) so you really have to think 
> it out. Perhaps others have done it but I never did when I used DSPAM 
> and even then, I used DSPAM in a situation similar to your current one 
> and it was all just testing. Who will create/manage the filter for the 
> virtual users?

Well, the only thing that really needs to be in the filter is this:

if $h_X-DSPAM-Result: is "Spam" then save mail/Junk

(or rather its maildir equivalent)

I am hopeful that I can add this to the appropriate pipeline - but as I 
am not all that familiar with maildir nor with the details of exim this 
could be a challenge.  :-)

Basically each user drags their spam into a spam folder. dspam trains on 
it.  If they get a false positive they drag it to a nospam folder.  It 
should not be a problem to modify my dospam script to spider through 
vexim spool dirs looking for stuff in the spam and notspam folders and 
feeding them to dspam.




> To setup vexim with DSPAM, you will need to understand DSPAM so well 
> so let's not dwell on that as you already do and know the right script 
> to run to create what relevant tables that DSPAM requires.
> To integrate DSPAM with Exim within the vexim configuration, you need 
> to disable the ditch_spam router and replace it with the relevant 
> dspam router. So you just comment it out and add the following line 
> below it:
>
> .include /usr/local/etc/exim/vexim-router-dspam.conf
>
> You will need an equivalent transport. So anywhere in the transports 
> sectionm just add:
>
> .include /usr/local/etc/exim/vexim-transport-dspam.conf
>
> You can fine the vexim-router-dspam.conf and 
> vexim-transport-dspam.conf at http://41.203.209.29/~wash/vexim 
> <http://41.203.209.29/%7Ewash/vexim> (temporarily put there for you).
>
> As I mentioned earlier, you really have to think this out if you are 
> to have system accounts (real users) and virtual users. I am not sure 
> I know how you can use a .forward file with virtual users.
>
> At this stage, with the correct DSPAM setup, you will be able to pass 
> messages through DSPAM and depening on the DSPAM setup, they will be 
> delivered or quarantined. Beyond that point, unless others on this 
> list can chip in, you are on your own:-)
>
> Let's see what you come up with...we may chip in at another stage.

I'll give it a try.   Thanks for the offer.  It may be a while before I 
can really take a crack at it - I'm going overseas for Christmas and I 
am going to forget about all this for a while.  :-)

--Yan