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i just have a laptop with an internet connection, but i keep changing the internet provider. i want to be able to send mails from my laptop to real addresses. i dont want to use smtp. can i configure sendmail, or any other program to send mails from my laptop? i tried installing sendmail with "sudo apt-get install sendmail" but when i try sending mail, example through actionmailer in rails, of mail() call in php through a web program, the mail does not get delivered. what am i doing wrong, and how can i fix this?

umar
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    You can't (reasonably) send email without using SMTP (what do you think sendmail does?!) - and you do need to have a proper SMTP server on a sane host, email coming from the ip addresses that ISPs will tend to assign you tend to get flagged as "Probably spam from someone infected with a Trojan". – Quentin Dec 14 '10 at 07:52
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    I wish user11825 had submitted his comment above as a real answer. He is right that you can do what you want with a mail server (like sendmail) on your laptop, but this will *still* be doing SMTP to pass the mail along. But his killer win is the observation about email coming from domestic IP ranges; this is the kiss-of-death for email with many anti-spam systems. Also, many ISPs now block outbound port 25 connections, so your laptop will sometimes fail to send mail when it's on networks with such a policy. SMTP AUTH to a trusted mail relay would be a much better idea. – MadHatter Dec 14 '10 at 07:56
  • I now know that sendmail also uses smtp, thanks for the comment :). But I would still like to set up sendmail from domestic ip ranges in the hope that my ISP hasnt blocked port 25, and that i may be allowed to bypass anti-spam systems. i am interested in knowing if it is possible at all to configure something on my system that can send mail without asking me to set up smtp. i would not mind some smtp like so: – umar Dec 25 '10 at 13:15
  • :address => "localhost", :port => "25", :user_name => "somebody@nonexistantdomain.com", :password => "whatever" – umar Dec 25 '10 at 13:17

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Sendmail can be a bit tedious to setup or troubleshoot.. I'd suggest using Postfix :)

Joril
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