INSTALL

   1 public-inbox (server-side) installation
   2 ---------------------------------------
   3
   4 This is for folks who want to setup their own public-inbox instance.
   5 Clients should use normal git-clone/git-fetch, IMAP or NNTP clients
   6 if they want to import mail into their personal inboxes.
   7
   8 As of 2021, public-inbox is packaged by several OS distributions,
   9 listed in alphabetical order: Debian, NixOS, and Void Linux.
  10
  11 public-inbox is developed on Debian GNU/Linux systems and will
  12 never depend on packages outside of the "main" component of
  13 the "stable" distribution, currently Debian 10.x ("buster"),
  14 but older versions of Debian remain supported.
  15
  16 Most packages are available in other GNU/Linux distributions
  17 and FreeBSD.  CentOS 7.x users will likely want newer git and
  18 Xapian packages for better performance and v2 inbox support:
  19 https://public-inbox.org/meta/20210421151308.yz5hzkgm75klunpe@nitro.local/
  20
  21 TODO: this still needs to be documented better,
  22 also see the scripts/ and sa_config/ directories in the source tree
  23
  24 Requirements
  25 ------------
  26
  27 public-inbox requires a number of other packages to access its full
  28 functionality.  The core tools are, of course:
  29
  30 * Git (1.8.0+, 2.6+ for writing v2 inboxes)
  31 * Perl 5.10.1+
  32 * DBD::SQLite (needed for IMAP, NNTP, message threading, and v2 inboxes)
  33
  34 To accept incoming mail into a public inbox, you'll likely want:
  35
  36 * MTA - postfix is recommended (for public-inbox-mda)
  37 * SpamAssassin (spamc/spamd)   (for public-inbox-watch/public-inbox-mda)
  38
  39 Beyond that, there is one non-standard Perl module required:
  40
  41 * URI::Escape                      deb: liburi-perl
  42                                    pkg: p5-URI
  43                                    rpm: perl-URI
  44                                    (for HTML/Atom generation)
  45
  46 Plack and Date::Parse are optional as of public-inbox v1.3.0,
  47 but required for older releases:
  48
  49 * Plack                            deb: libplack-perl
  50                                    pkg: p5-Plack
  51                                    rpm: perl-Plack, perl-Plack-Test,
  52                                    (for HTML/Atom generation)
  53
  54 - Date::Parse                      deb: libtimedate-perl
  55                                    pkg: p5-TimeDate
  56                                    rpm: perl-TimeDate
  57                                    (for broken, mostly historical emails)
  58
  59 Where "deb" indicates package names for Debian-derived distributions,
  60 "pkg" is for the FreeBSD package (maybe other common BSDs, too), and
  61 "rpm" is for RPM-based distributions (only known to work on Fedora).
  62
  63 Numerous optional modules are likely to be useful as well:
  64
  65 - DBD::SQLite                      deb: libdbd-sqlite3-perl
  66                                    pkg: p5-DBD-SQLite
  67                                    rpm: perl-DBD-SQLite
  68                                    (for v2, IMAP, NNTP, or gzipped mboxes)
  69
  70 - Search::Xapian or Xapian(.pm)    deb: libsearch-xapian-perl
  71                                    pkg: p5-Search-Xapian OR p5-Xapian
  72                                    rpm: perl-Search-Xapian
  73                                    (HTTP and IMAP search)
  74
  75 - Net::Server                      deb: libnet-server-perl
  76                                    pkg: pkg-Net-Server
  77                                    rpm: perl-Net-Server
  78                                    (for HTTP/IMAP/NNTP background daemons,
  79                                     not needed as systemd services or
  80                                     foreground servers)
  81
  82 - Inline::C                        deb: libinline-c-perl
  83                                    pkg: pkg-Inline-C
  84                                    rpm: perl-Inline (or perl-Inline-C)
  85                                    (speeds up process spawning on Linux,
  86                                     see public-inbox-daemon(8))
  87
  88 - Email::Address::XS               deb: libemail-address-xs-perl
  89                                    pkg: pkg-Email-Address-XS
  90                                    (correct parsing of tricky email
  91                                     addresses, phrases and comments,
  92                                     required for IMAP)
  93
  94 - Parse::RecDescent                deb: libparse-recdescent-perl
  95                                    pkg: p5-Parse-RecDescent
  96                                    rpm: perl-ParseRecDescent
  97                                    (optional, for public-inbox-imapd(1))
  98
  99 - BSD::Resource                    deb: libbsd-resource-perl
 100                                    pkg: p5-BSD-Resource
 101                                    rpm: perl-BSD-Resource
 102                                    (optional, for PSGI limiters
 103                                     see public-inbox-config(5))
 104
 105 - Plack::Middleware::ReverseProxy  deb: libplack-middleware-reverseproxy-perl
 106                                    pkg: p5-Plack-Middleware-ReverseProxy
 107                                    rpm: perl-Plack-Middleware-ReverseProxy
 108                                    (ensures redirects are correct when running
 109                                     behind nginx or Varnish)
 110
 111 * highlight                        deb: libhighlight-perl
 112                                    (for syntax highlighting with coderepo)
 113
 114 * xapian-compact (tool)            deb: xapian-tools
 115                                    pkg: xapian-core
 116                                    rpm: xapian-core
 117                                    (optional, for public-inbox-compact(1))
 118
 119 - Linux::Inotify2                  deb: liblinux-inotify2-perl
 120                                    rpm: perl-Linux-Inotify2
 121                                    (for public-inbox-watch and -imapd on Linux)
 122
 123 The following module is typically pulled in by dependencies listed
 124 above, so there is no need to explicitly install them:
 125
 126 - DBI                              deb: libdbi-perl
 127                                    pkg: p5-DBI
 128                                    rpm: perl-DBI
 129                                    (pulled in by DBD::SQLite)
 130
 131 Uncommonly needed modules (see HACKING for development-only modules):
 132
 133 - Socket6                          deb: libsocket6-perl
 134                                    pkg: p5-Socket6
 135                                    rpm: perl-Socket6
 136                                    (pulled in by SpamAssassin and Net::Server,
 137                                     only necessary if using IPv6 with
 138                                     Plack::Middleware::AccessLog or similar
 139                                     on Perl <= 5.12)
 140
 141 - Crypt::CBC                       deb: libcrypt-cbc-perl
 142                                    pkg: p5-Crypt-CBC
 143                                    (for PublicInbox::Unsubscribe (rarely used))
 144
 145 standard MakeMaker installation (Perl)
 146 --------------------------------------
 147
 148 To use MakeMaker, you need to ensure ExtUtils::MakeMaker is available.
 149 This is typically installed with Perl, but RPM-based systems will likely
 150 need to install the `perl-ExtUtils-MakeMaker' package.
 151
 152 Once the dependencies are installed, you should be able to build and
 153 install the system (into /usr/local) with:
 154
 155         perl Makefile.PL
 156         make
 157         make test    # see HACKING for faster tests for hackers
 158         make install # root permissions may be needed
 159
 160 symlink-install (public-inbox.git and 1.7.0+)
 161 ---------------------------------------------
 162
 163 For users who lack permissions and/or wish to minimize their
 164 installation footprint, the "symlink-install" target is available in
 165 public-inbox.git.  The following installs symlinks to $HOME/bin
 166 pointing to the source tree:
 167
 168         perl Makefile.PL
 169         make symlink-install prefix=$HOME
 170
 171 Other installation notes
 172 ------------------------
 173
 174 Debian 8.x (jessie) users, use Debian 8.5 or later if using Xapian:
 175         https://bugs.debian.org/808610
 176
 177 public-inbox will never store unregeneratable data in Xapian
 178 or any other search database we might use; Xapian corruption
 179 will not destroy critical data.
 180
 181 See the public-inbox-overview(7) man page for the next steps once
 182 the installation is complete.
 183
 184 The following required packages are part of the Perl standard
 185 library.  Debian-based distros put them in "libperl5.$MINOR" or
 186 "perl-modules-5.$MINOR"; and FreeBSD puts them in "perl5".
 187 RPM-based distros split them out into separate packages:
 188
 189 * Digest::SHA                      rpm: perl-Digest-SHA
 190 * Data::Dumper                     rpm: perl-Data-Dumper
 191 * Encode                           rpm: perl-Encode
 192 * IO::Compress                     rpm: perl-IO-Compress
 193 * Storable                         rpm: perl-Storable
 194 * Text::ParseWords                 rpm: perl-Text-Parsewords
 195
 196 Copyright
 197 ---------
 198
 199 Copyright 2013-2021 all contributors <meta@public-inbox.org>
 200 License: AGPL-3.0+ <https://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl-3.0.txt>