Here is something I ran into today.
I setup virtualmin to email me on updates and I noticed that there was nowhere to define the host the updates were sent from.
Thats because there sent from the actual hostname of the physical box which seems fair enough as thats where the updates are from.
Just 1 issue with it though, doesn't work too well when the internal hostname isn't a real externally accessible dns hostname.
As I call my box server.revnet being revnet my local lan, that dns name is only available inside my network and I set up virtual servers in virtualmin which are my external name. This is a little more personal for me as I do home stuff also.
It would be nice if I set one of my external hostnames to send the virtualmin updates emails from , as I run personally for my own use drguild.noip.me which would be ideal for thisas other external sites will be for other purposes.
I know I could email myself the emails from virtualmin to the drguild user internally on the server and login remotely that way via pop3 dav (I haven't set logging in client side yet) or something like usermin/roundcube to view mails which is a way round it that may be considered the main way by you guys.
But I like using my gmail for receiving most emails nowadays and have it on tablet/phone etc and always active at my pc.
While the mails still get through on gmail they show up as server.revnet in the return path which I tried to fix and did as of last week for external servers.
So too long didn't read section:
Can we assign a virtual server as our designated sender of server update and other mail for those of us where our internal default domain is a lan only one?
I think you can configure the sending email address in the Webmin:Webmin Configuration:Sending Email page.
I'm pretty sure Virtualmin picks up configuration like this from the Webmin configuration. If not, it probably is still configurable (because darned near everything in Virtualmin is configurable), but I dunno where it'd be off-hand.
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Another case of me not knowing where all the options are hidden and how they all link together as this stuff isn't really mentioned.
I feel like a absolute noob again.
Mby a URL link in virtualmins package schedule and email notification area to the webmin sending email page would make it a little friendlier to find.
It's a very large system. You shouldn't feel too much like a noob when it's so large that even I sometimes have to poke around a bit to find stuff, and I've been using Webmin for almost it's entire existence (roughly 15 years, now).
But, I think you're probably right that there should be some more clear paths between Virtualmin and Webmin when the two overlap like this. It's not always apparent to new users how tightly integrated Virtualmin is with Webmin, and how many things in Virtualmin are configurable or adjustable or made more awesome by stuff within Webmin.
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Yea agreed I shouldn't like a noob there's that many options that a new user even with a little basic experience in technology who hasn't really used the system before may not know what everything does or how it relates to each other.
All the features and customisability is why we love virtualmin & webmin soo much just the end design could be improved.
I posted in the blue skies where someone suggested a wiki, I think going the community governance model for documentation would work especially well for this.
It lets the community themself help you on the project in a area so you can focus more of your energies into creating the software.
As well as some community mods would be ideal as 1-5 minutes reading and then replying to posts for basic stuff like mine adds up into tens of hours per month which could be spent improving and making the software more user friendly and easier to use. And to me it is embarrassing somewhat to me and my skill level even to myself if its a really basic thing that I wouldn't have known about due to lack of proper info.
I changed webmin to use a email address from my hostname in 'From address for email from Webmin' and it stopped sending me emails and never got any the last couple days updates.
I have changed it back to test.
The webmin test send email worked.
Nothing was shown in the postfix maillog in /var/log/maillog
I'll see what putting it back does then when I enable the from address and check again.
Ok its been a couple weeks and I have some weird stuff going on.
If I put a custom email address in webmins 'From address for email from Webmin' email area I don't get emails if I leave it as 'Default' I start getting the update emails again.
I have added and removed the email a couple times with this exact behavior and this update II never received info from so I have just put it as default for another test.
The test email from the webmin sending email area works as intended so I know my custom email I put in does work.
The emails were sent using the local server command I will try the local SMTP to mail server no login option and see on both a custom and default email out of interest.
Could someone look into this if its a bug and what could be causing it I find it very strange.
I assume its not allowing parsing the update emails properly with the different address and somehow blocking them etc.
I don't know if emails are only for virtualmin packages or for system packages also.
In my understanding they should be for all packages for updating, system or virtualmin ones.