📧 Mail User Management Tool

A feature-rich CLI tool for managing Dovecot mail users with beautiful colored output and comprehensive error handling.

✨ Features

• 🎨 Beautiful colored logging with indicators
• 🔧 Build-time configuration via config.json
• 🚀 Cross-platform support - builds for 20+ OS/architecture combinations
• 🔐 Secure password handling with interactive prompts and masking
• ✅ Input validation for email addresses and user existence
• 🛡️ Safety features with confirmation prompts for destructive operations
• 📦 Single binary with no runtime dependencies (except Dovecot)
• 🎯 Production-ready with comprehensive error handling

📋 Requirements

• Go 1.16+ (for building)
• Dovecot with doveadm command
• Root/sudo privileges (for running)
• jq (for building with Makefile)
• Linux/Unix-like system with systemctl

🚀 Quick Start

1. Clone and Configure

git clone https://github.com/jelius-sama/mail-mgmt.git
cd mail-mgmt

2. Edit Configuration

Edit config.json to match your system:

{
    "Version": "1.0.0",
    "PasswdFile": "/etc/dovecot/passwd",
    "VmailBaseDir": "/var/vmail",
    "DovecotService": "dovecot",
    "VmailUser": "vmail",
    "VmailGroup": "mail",
    "HashScheme": "SHA512-CRYPT",
    "DoveadmCmd": "doveadm"
}

3. Build

# Build for your current system
make host_default

# Build for all supported platforms
make all

# Clean build artifacts
make clean

The binary will be in bin/mail-mgmt (or bin/mail-mgmt-<os>-<arch> for cross-compiled builds).

4. Install (Optional)

sudo cp bin/mail-mgmt /usr/local/bin/
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/mail-mgmt

📖 Usage

Create a New User

Interactive (recommended):

sudo mail-mgmt create -user john@example.com

Non-interactive:

sudo mail-mgmt create -user john@example.com -password "SecurePassword123"

What it does:

• Validates email format
• Checks if user already exists
• Prompts for password (with confirmation if interactive)
• Generates SHA512-CRYPT hash
• Adds user to /etc/dovecot/passwd
• Creates Maildir structure (/var/vmail/domain/user/Maildir/{cur,new,tmp})
• Sets proper ownership and permissions
• Reloads Dovecot service

Delete a User

With confirmation:

sudo mail-mgmt delete -user john@example.com

Skip confirmation:

sudo mail-mgmt delete -user john@example.com -yes

What it does:

• Validates email format
• Checks if user exists
• Confirms deletion (unless -yes flag is used)
• Removes user from /etc/dovecot/passwd
• Deletes entire Maildir directory
• Reloads Dovecot service

Change Password

Interactive (recommended):

sudo mail-mgmt change-password -user john@example.com
# or use the alias:
sudo mail-mgmt passwd -user john@example.com

Non-interactive:

sudo mail-mgmt change-password -user john@example.com \
    -old-password "OldPassword" \
    -new-password "NewPassword123"

What it does:

• Validates email format
• Checks if user exists
• Verifies old password against stored hash
• Prompts for new password (with confirmation if interactive)
• Generates new hash
• Updates /etc/dovecot/passwd
• Reloads Dovecot service

Help and Version

# Show help
sudo mail-mgmt help

# Show version and build configuration
sudo mail-mgmt version

🎨 Output Examples

Success:

ℹ INFO  Creating mail user: john@example.com
→ Enter password for john@example.com:
→ Confirm password:
→ Generating password hash...
→ Adding user to /etc/dovecot/passwd...
→ Creating Maildir structure...
→ Reloading Dovecot...
✓ SUCCESS User created successfully: john@example.com

Error:

✗ ERROR  User already exists: john@example.com

Warning:

⚠ WARNING This will permanently delete user john@example.com and all their emails

🏗️ Build Configuration

The build process uses ldflags to inject configuration from config.json at compile time. This means:

• No runtime configuration files needed - everything is embedded in the binary
• Zero-dependency deployment - just copy the binary

Configuration Options

Option	Default	Description
Version	1.0.0	Application version
PasswdFile	/etc/dovecot/passwd	Path to Dovecot passwd file
VmailBaseDir	/var/vmail	Base directory for mail storage
DovecotService	dovecot	Systemd service name
VmailUser	vmail	System user for mail files
VmailGroup	mail	System group for mail files
HashScheme	SHA512-CRYPT	Password hashing scheme
DoveadmCmd	doveadm	Path to doveadm command

Cross-Platform Builds

The Makefile supports building for multiple platforms:

# Build for your host platform
make host_default

# Build for specific platform
make linux_arm64

# Build for all platforms
make cross

Supported platforms:

• Linux: amd64, arm, arm64, ppc64, ppc64le, mips, mipsle, mips64, mips64le, s390x
• macOS: amd64 (Intel), arm64 (Apple Silicon)
• FreeBSD: amd64, 386
• OpenBSD: amd64, 386, arm64
• NetBSD: amd64, 386, arm
• DragonFly BSD: amd64
• Solaris: amd64
• Plan 9: 386, amd64

🔧 Development

Project Structure

.
├── main.go           # Main application code
├── config.json       # Build-time configuration
├── Makefile          # Build automation
└── README.md         # This file

TODO

1. Add a list command:

case "list":
    handleList()

2. Add export/import for bulk operations:

sudo mail-mgmt export > users.csv
sudo mail-mgmt import users.csv

3. Add quota management:

sudo mail-mgmt quota -user john@example.com -size 5G

4. Add email alias management:

sudo mail-mgmt alias add -from info@example.com -to john@example.com

🐛 Troubleshooting

"This program must be run as root"

The tool needs root privileges to modify system files and reload Dovecot.

sudo mail-mgmt <command>

"doveadm: command not found"

Install Dovecot or update DoveadmCmd in config.json to the full path.

# Find doveadm location
which doveadm

"Failed to reload Dovecot"

Check if Dovecot service is running:

sudo systemctl status dovecot

Build errors with jq

Install jq for JSON parsing in Makefile:

# Ubuntu/Debian
sudo apt-get install jq

# macOS
brew install jq

# CentOS/RHEL
sudo yum install jq

📝 License

LICENSE

🤝 Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request.

👨‍💻 Author

Jelius Basumatary

🙏 Acknowledgments

• Built with Go
• Designed for Dovecot mail server
• Inspired by the need for better mail user management tools