sys-svc-mail 📧

Description

The sys-svc-mail role acts as the central mail orchestration layer in the Infinito.Nexus stack.
It wires together:

  • Mailu as a full-featured mail server (when available),

  • msmtp as a lightweight sendmail-compatible SMTP client, and

  • an optional local SMTP relay (Postfix) for hosts without Mailu.

For more background on the underlying protocol, see Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) on Wikipedia.

Overview

This role provides a unified mail setup for your hosts:

  • If the host is part of the web-app-mailu group, it:

    • checks the reachability of the Mailu endpoint,

    • triggers Mailu startup via the Infinito.Nexus helper (utils/load_app.yml),

    • and prepares the system to send emails through Mailu using the sys-svc-mail-msmtp role.

  • If the host is not running Mailu, it:

    • optionally configures a local SMTP relay via sys-svc-mail-smtp (Postfix on localhost:25),

    • and still configures msmtp as a sendmail-compatible client.

This makes sys-svc-mail the canonical entrypoint for “mail capabilities” on a node, abstracting away whether the actual delivery happens via Mailu or a local relay.

Purpose

The main purpose of this role is to:

  • Provide a consistent mail-sending interface for all hosts in the Infinito.Nexus ecosystem.

  • Automatically choose between:

    • Mailu-backed delivery (with authentication tokens), or

    • a local SMTP relay on localhost, depending on the presence of web-app-mailu in the host’s groups.

  • Ensure that system services and applications can always send notifications (e.g. health checks, alerts, job results) without each role having to care about the underlying mail plumbing.

Features

  • 🔄 Mailu Integration (when available)

    • Checks Mailu reachability using Ansible’s uri module.

    • Triggers Mailu startup via utils/load_app.yml.

    • Ensures handlers are flushed/reset via utils/load_handlers.yml.

  • 💡 Smart Fallback to Localhost

    • If no web-app-mailu is present, the role can configure a local Postfix-based SMTP relay via sys-svc-mail-smtp.

    • Combined with sys-svc-mail-msmtp, this enables sending mail via localhost:25 without additional configuration in other roles.

  • 📨 msmtp Client Configuration

    • Delegates installation and configuration of msmtp to sys-svc-mail-msmtp.

    • Supports both authenticated Mailu delivery and unauthenticated localhost-based delivery.

  • 🧩 Composable Design

    • Uses internal run_once_* flags to avoid repeated setup.

    • Cleanly integrates with the Infinito.Nexus stack and shared utilities.

Further Resources