PowerMTA

***zilla*** · 10-09-2012, 12:09 PM

I use PowerMTA 3.5 and PowerMTA 4.0 - I have a custom modded version of Active Campaign with built in spintax and a few other mods for proper use of the VMTA feature found within PowerMTA. I also have the custom Interspire addons Multiple MTA, MultiThread, FBL, IP Rep Checker, ISP Analysis, etc. Also, a custom python injector. I use them all (on different servers of course) Where both totally kick ass and send ridicules amounts of email and incredible speeds I think both front ends limit the true power of PowerMTA and I want to do a custom html front-end using the python injector. I was curious what anyone else here that uses either of the PowerMTAs use, and why they prefer it?

***krishparmar83*** · 10-09-2012, 02:31 PM

I am using interspire with powermta and its doing very well so far.

***zilla*** · 10-09-2012, 11:02 PM

Well as well as I admit that it does work - in reality it doesn't make use of all of PowerMTA's capability, hence the reason I want to write an html front-end for the python injector. The thing is with interspire is that it doesn't make full use of the individual MTA's and the modded active campaign I have does, but then has a problem with the "list-unsubscribe" and "open tracking" when using anything other than the main vmta, it will leak a footprint. I can not setup tracking and do a manual unsubscribe using a "mailto" link in a campaign just fine when utilizing all other vmta's and NOT leak a footprint. So I've done plenty of research and it seems that majority of the powermta mailers, use the api. Checking out the api and injector thoroughly and it seems thats the way to go, as I don't see any limitations whatsoever in the api. Has anyone else looked into this?

***krishparmar83*** · 10-09-2012, 11:19 PM

I have just started mass emailing, still to learn a lot mate...hope you find or make better solution for front end.

***KillahBee87*** · 10-10-2012, 01:21 AM

HEy Zilla,

I am currently in the same boat trying to find the best solution for feeding powermta. Where did you get your modded activecampaign version? I would love to see that. Should me a PM with your skype plz. I just joined here because of your post.

You should be able to solve your tracking and list unsub problem with .htaccess easily. I did in the past and it was hard.

***Fiberoptic*** · 10-10-2012, 07:00 PM

I didn't see anything in PowerMTA's features list that can't easily be implemented with an open source mail transfer agent (i.e. Postfix or Sendmail). The Wiki of mail server comparison and mail transfer agents don't even list PowerMTA... Pretty much the only thing PowerMTA has that's better is the fancy graphical user interface.

***zilla*** · 10-10-2012, 10:25 PM

@KillahBee97, I have custom django front end that utilizes the python injector that will be done within the next day or so. The modded active campaign is mine, myself and a couple of friends helped me mod most of it, and then I had to hire a coder to do the rest. It does now utilize the vmta's, but as I stated when using any other vmta but the main servers - you have to remove tracking and the unsub and change the unsub to a mailto link to remove any footprint of the main vmta. This works good and is my daily worker for now. .htaccess? From my understanding - I am not sure how that's possible. I would definitely be interested. But the problem with the tracking and the unsub has to do with what is inserted into email. .htaccess controls when people come to your site. So even if you used the .htaccess to redirect visitors to the appropriate places, it doesn't solve the problem with the content that gets inserted into the mail. Am I missing something?

@Fiberoptic, you're clearly missing the point of the post. In addition, you definitely have not used PowerMTA making a statement like that. For starters, to do what all PowerMTA does with postfix or sendmail is just not feasible, even if it is possible. I used Postfix for several years before I started using PowerMTA. The main thing is utilization of the VMTA's. Secondly, would be it's beautiful use of 'backoff'. There are quite a few other reasons to use PowerMTA over opensource MTA's. Do you really think companies would pay the thousands of dollars for the licensing if it wasn't all that and a bag of chips?

***KillahBee87*** · 10-11-2012, 02:03 AM

What kind of sending speeds are you seeing with your injector? Are you willing to sell your version of active?

What I mean is changing the variable of the code of the code to whatever domain your sending from. It actually pretty easily done. THe way I mail curretnly is htat I mail a large batch form one domain/IP combo and dont rotate until my next drop. So i can hardcode it in for the unsub and tracking pic to resemble the domain my vmta is sending from. Than just put your htaacess on that domain and tell it to strip out your sending domain and change just the domain part of it too whereever you have ac on. Thus your unsubs, opens and cliks will be correctly tracked. Of yourse you need dns on all your sneding domains. I don't know if you currently handel through the registrar.
Surely this can also be handled to rotate thorugh different vmtas.

@Fiberoptic Good luck trying to get postfix or exim to the point of being a powermta. Its definitely doable.

***Fiberoptic*** · 10-11-2012, 03:31 AM

@Zilla, What's the volume of mail that you need to send?

The annual licence fee PowerMTA is $3,750.00... So, no I haven't tried it and I doubt I ever will. If you need to send out 1 million emails / hour then it looks like a good option with the virtual-MTAs that it provides.

Sendmail is an industrial strength MTA used by A LOT more corporations than PowerMTA for emailing. Maybe you should try to have a chat with a Linux mail admin to learn what it can really do... The best email servers are open source because of the flexibility they offer. You can find open source plug-ins for Sendmail that will do the everything that PowerMTA can do for FREE.

@KillahBee87, I use Sendmail with some open source plugins that allow for faster sending speeds.

***zilla*** · 10-11-2012, 07:13 AM

I apologize if this sounds rude, but that's just ignorant. You say in one statement you've never used it - but "everything" it can do there is plugins for sendmail that can do for free. I am a linux server/mail server admin - and not in their mothers basement kind, professionally. Sendmail is in fact the most widely used MTA( I believe the sendmail wrapper is standard in most linux distros), I won't argue that. But these are two totally different beasts, it's like comparing apples and oranges. I've used almost everything commercially available and further customized these things. I've had programmers such as yourself make tools and coders make scripts that are unique to my needs. Never, have I found anyone who has a setup that can compare to PowerMTA with a customized front-end, with the exception of inter7 robomailer and volomp, but yet again - you're paying out the ass. This thread seems to be getting away from my original topic - so I will just leave it at that.