Introduction

Merak Mail Server Power Pack has built – in Web Mail Client Server, which is installed together with the mail server. Web Mail client server can be called with URL:

In real „Internet Scenario“ it will be:

Where yourdomain is name of your registered Interent domain (with Cname and MX records at DNS server)

The Web Mail Admin features are awailable through URL:

If you have mobile phone with the WAP features, your login to the mail through mobile phone is:

Let‘s imagine, that your domain has name ICEWARP.COM. Your default Web Mail access is:

Note: Admin access to the Mail Server is through URL http://yourdomain:32000/

But sometimes you want to access your mail with more „user friendly“ URL. Or you want to access Web Mail with the several users and different entry screens and setting. All that can be solved by IceWarp Web Mail VIRTUAL HOSTS feature.

To demonstrate VIRTUAL HOSTS features we need often to make changes on DNS Server. In real „Internet Scenario“ it is not so easy, since changes on DNS are replicated worldwide within 24 hours (or more...). We will use computer with Windows 2000 Server and default IP address 127.0.0.1 called localhost.

IChanges in mapping this IP address to the various names will be done in file:

Virtual Hosts Redirection

Example 1:

Instead of calling Web Mail by http://localhost:32000/mail/ we will use:

Edit file \WINNT\system32\drivers\etc\hosts

webmail.localhost

2. Open file \Program Files\Merak\config\webserver.cfg

and to the section [Virtual-Host] enter redirection command:

webmail.localhost=c:\program files\merak\html\mail\

[Default] ; [filename] index.html index.wml

[Filter] ; [file type]=[script interpreter file path] ; [executable file type]= .html=C:\Program Files\Merak\webmail\web.dll .wml=C:\Program Files\Merak\webmail\web.dll

[Virtual-Host] ; [hostname]=[base path]

webmail.localhost= c:\program files\merak\html\mail\

[Free-Path] ; [path] C:\Program Files\Merak\html\demo\ C:\Program Files\Merak\html\mail\

And to the section [Virtual-Host] enter redirection command:

webmail.localhost=c:\program files\merak\html\mail\

Run you Explorer and try URL: http://webmail.localhost:32000/

You see, that your “symbolic name” webmail.localhost has been redirected to the Web Mail Login screen. Admin access is through: http://webmail.localhost:32000/admin/.

If you want to create access to your mail using WAP enabled phone, your line in the webmail.cfg will be:

webmail.localhost= c:\program files\merak\html\mail\wap\

Multidomain Virtual Hosts Configuration

Multidomain Virtual Hosts Configuration allows you to create Web Mail login and configuration for each domain user.

The example below will show you, how to create Web Mail for two domains:

CNN.COM and ICEWARP.COM

Each Web Mail User will have it’s own login URL, logo and other setting.

To achieve that we have to:

Prepare domain names at DNS

Prepare folders for virtual hosting of these domains and copy webmail folders from “standard” installation

Create virtual domain redirection in webmail.cfg

Create virtual domain redirection in config.html

Change setting for each domain (logo, etc.) – if needed

Before you will steps above, you have to be able log-in as admin to the Web Mail:

http://webmail.localhost:32000/admin/

Do do that, create “admin level” account at Merak Mail Server first.

Prepare domain names at DNS

To emulate DNS at your PC, where the Merak Mail Server Power Pack is installed, add the two new IP addresses to your TCP/IP network Adapter Protocol.

IP addresses for our example are: 192.168.100.100 and 192.168.100.101.

Then add lines to your hosts file: \WINNT\system32\drivers\etc\hosts

192.168.100.100 cnn.com

101 icewarp.com

Prepare folders for virtual hosting of these domains

Create folder virtualhosts with subfolders cnn.com and icewarp.com.

We will create virtual host cnn.com first now. Copy the folder \Program Files\merak\html\mail\ and \Program Files\merak\webmail to the folder \virtualhosts\cnn.com\.

Rename foder mail to the html. If you will prepare folders also for icewarp.com, your folders structure will look like:

Create virtual domain redirection in webmail.cfg

Open file: \Program Files\Merak\config\webserver.cfg and to the section [Virtual-Host] add two more “redirection lines”.

[Virtual-Host] ; [hostname]=[base path] webmail.localhost=c:\program files\merak\html\mail\ cnn.com=c:\virtualhosts\cnn.com\html\ icewarp.com=c:\virtualhosts\icewarp.com\html\

Create virtual domain redirection in config.html

Prepare file (in text editor) config.html with: <? $SERVER_INSTALL_PATH = "c:/virtualhosts/cnn.com/webmail/"; ?>

and copy it to the html folder of the cnn.com virtual hosts structure.

\virtualhosts\cnn.com\html\config.html

Warning! The config.html can not use backslash (alt – 92) in path.

Do the same do icewarp.com. The content of the config.html is: <? $SERVER_INSTALL_PATH = "c:/virtualhosts/icewarp.com/webmail/"; ?>

We are done. Try to run your web mail for icewarp.com:

http://icewarp.com:32000/

You see your regular “log-in screen” with the IceWarp logo.

Change setting for each domain

Log-in to the cnn.com as admin:

http://cnn.com:32000/admin/

All changes you will do on Admin level will affect only cnn.com now.

Let’s change logo. We used file called cnnlogo.gif, placed into folder:

C:\virtualhosts\cnn.com\html\images\

Click on Settings (bottom of the screen) and set new logo file: cnnlogo.gif . Cahge default values to the:

Title Text: CNN Web Mail Logo File: C:\virtualhosts\cnn.com\html\images\cnnlogo.gif Logo Width: 260 Logo Height: 62

Click Save and CLOSE Browser.

Open your browser again for cnn.com Web Mail:

http://cnn.com:32000/

You will get a new log-in screen, with CNN logo.

Virtual Domains configuration is not se easy, but gives you incredible flexibility. You can have different Web Mail setting for each domain. All your customers will love “personalized log-in” screens, etc.