Last updated on July 1st, 2020 at 09:47 pm
In this tutorial, we are going to learn how to install Roundcube webmail on Debian 9. Roundcube webmail is a free and open source web-based IMAP email client. It is written in PHP and works just like any other email client. It provides a handful of features;
- Full support for MIME and HTML messages
- Sophisticated privacy protection
- Compose messages with attachments
- Multiple sender identities
- Full featured address book with groups and LDAP connectors
- Find-as-you-type address book integration
- Richtext/HTML message composing
- Forwarding messages with attachments
- Searching messages and contacts
- Spell checking
You can find comprehensive list of features of Roundcube here.
Prerequisites
As stated, Roundcube Webmail is written in PHP and thus it runs on a standard LAMPP server. The following are the minimum server requirements;
- Apache, Lighttpd, Nginx, Cherokee or Hiawatha web server
- PHP Version 5.4 or greater
- MySQL, PostgreSQL, SQLite, MSSQL or Oracle database
- SMTP server and IMAP server with IMAP4 rev1 support
- PEAR packages distributed with Roundcube
Before you can proceed with installation and configuration of Roundcube webmail on Debian 9, update and upgrade your server packages;
apt update apt upgrade
Download Roundcube
The latest stable release version for Rouncube can be installed by downloading the source code from the Roundcube downloads page. Download the Complete package under the Stable version section. Once you get the link, you can simply download it as shown below;
wget -P /tmp/ https://github.com/roundcube/roundcubemail/releases/download/1.3.8/roundcubemail-1.3.8-complete.tar.g
Extract the Roundcube tarball archive to the web root directory.
mkdir /var/www/roundcube tar xzf /tmp/roundcubemail-1.3.8-complete.tar.gz -C /var/www/roundcube --strip-components 1
Set proper ownership for roundcube root directory and permissions for Roundcube /temp and /logs directories;
chown -R www-data.www-data /var/www/roundcube/
chmod -R 775 /var/www/roundcube/{temp,logs}
The /config, /temp and /logs directories should be protected.
Install and Configure Apache Web Server
In this tutorial, we are going to use Apache as our web server. Therefore, follow through to install and configure it.
Install Apache
apt install apache2 -y
Apache is started and enabled by default after installation.
If UFW is running, allow Apache2.
ufw allow WWW < allows HTTP ufw allow "WWW Full" < allows both HTTP and HTTPs ufw reload
Configure Apache Virtualhost for Roundcube
Next, it is wise to create a dedicated Apache virtualhost configuration file for Roundcube instead of editing the default Apache configuration. To create one see below;
vim /etc/apache2/sites-available/roundcube.conf
<VirtualHost *:80>
ServerName roundcube.example.com
ServerAdmin [email protected]
DocumentRoot /var/www/roundcube
<Directory /var/www/roundcube>
Options +FollowSymLinks
AddType text/x-component .htc
<IfModule mod_php7.c>
php_flag display_errors Off
php_flag log_errors On
php_value upload_max_filesize 10M
php_value post_max_size 12M
php_value memory_limit 64M
php_flag zlib.output_compression Off
php_flag magic_quotes_gpc Off
php_flag magic_quotes_runtime Off
php_flag zend.ze1_compatibility_mode Off
php_flag suhosin.session.encrypt Off
php_flag session.auto_start Off
php_value session.gc_maxlifetime 21600
php_value session.gc_divisor 500
php_value session.gc_probability 1
</IfModule>
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^favicon\.ico$ skins/larry/images/favicon.ico
RewriteRule ^(?!installer)(\.?[^\.]+)$ - [F]
RewriteRule ^/?(\.git|\.tx|SQL|bin|config|logs|temp|tests|program\/(include|lib|localization|steps)) - [F]
RewriteRule /?(README\.md|composer\.json-dist|composer\.json|package\.xml)$ - [F]
</IfModule>
<IfModule mod_deflate.c>
SetOutputFilter DEFLATE
</IfModule>
<IfModule mod_headers.c>
# replace 'append' with 'merge' for Apache version 2.2.9 and later
# Header append Cache-Control public env=!NO_CACHE
</IfModule>
<IfModule mod_expires.c>
ExpiresActive On
ExpiresDefault "access plus 1 month"
</IfModule>
FileETag MTime Size
<IfModule mod_autoindex.c>
Options -Indexes
</ifModule>
AllowOverride None
Order allow,deny
Allow from all
</Directory>
<Directory /var/www/roundcube/plugins/enigma/home>
Options -FollowSymLinks
AllowOverride None
Order allow,deny
Deny from all
</Directory>
<Directory /var/www/roundcube/config>
Options -FollowSymLinks
AllowOverride None
Order allow,deny
Deny from all
</Directory>
<Directory /var/www/roundcube/temp>
Options -FollowSymLinks
AllowOverride None
Order allow,deny
Deny from all
</Directory>
<Directory /var/www/roundcube/logs>
Options -FollowSymLinks
AllowOverride None
Order allow,deny
Deny from all
</Directory>
ErrorLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/roundcube-error.log
CustomLog ${APACHE_LOG_DIR}/roundcube-access.log combined
</VirtualHost>
Save and quit the configuration file.
If you need to use HTTPS, obtain the SSL/TLS certificates and configure Apache appropriately.
Disable Apache default site and enable Roundcube site.
a2dissite 000-default a2ensite roundcube
Enable the following Apache Modules
a2enmod deflate expires headers rewrite
Verify syntactical errors in Rouncube site configuration.
apachectl -t Syntax OK
Restart Apache if there is error.
systemctl restart apache2
Database Configuration
Roundcube supports various database backends as stated above. In this guide, we are going to use MySQL.
Install MySQL
MySQL is available on default Debian repositories and can be installed by running the command below;
apt-get install mysql-server -yRun the MySQL basic secure script to set the root password, remove test databases, disable remote root login and remove anonymous users.
mysql_secure_installation
Create Roundcube database and and grant privileges to a separate database user.
mysql -u root -p create database roundcube; grant all privileges on roundcube.* to [email protected] identified by "STRONGPASSWORD";
Be sure to replace the database, username and password accordingly.
Run the command below to reload the database tables and effect the changes made above. Quit the database after that.
flush privileges;
Log out of the MySQL command prompt;
quit
Import the Roundcube data to the newly created database above;
mysql -u root -p roundcube < /var/www/roundcube/SQL/mysql.initial.sql
Install and Configure PHP
PHP is a server side scripting language that helps generate dynamic web content. To install PHP and all the requires dependencies for Roundcube, run the command below;
apt-get install php php-mcrypt php-mysql php-gd php-xml php-mbstring php-intl php-zip php-json php-pear openssl composer -y
Install PEAR packages
pear install Net_SMTP Net_IDNA2-0.1.1 Mail_mime Mail_mimeDecode pear install channel://pear.php.net/Auth_SASL2-0.2.0
Configure PHP
Once the installation is done, run the command below to enable PHP mbstring, xml and dom modules respectively.
phpenmod mbstring xml dom mcrypt intl
Verify with the command;
php7.0 -m | egrep "mbs|int|dom|xml" dom intl libxml mbstring xml
Edit the /etc/php/7.0/apache2/php.ini and set the timezone
sed -i 's/^;date.timezone =/date.timezone = Africa\/Nairobi/g' /etc/php/7.0/apache2/php.ini
Configure Roundcube
Create Rouncube configuration file based on the sample configuration file. You can simply copy the sample config as shown below;
sudo -u www-data cp /var/www/roundcube/config/config.inc.php{.sample,}
Open the configuration file for editing and put the contents below;
vim /var/www/roundcube/config/config.inc.php
<?php // SQL DATABASE $config['db_dsnw'] = 'mysqli://admin:[email protected]/roundcube'; // LOGGING $config['log_driver'] = 'syslog'; $config['syslog_facility'] = LOG_MAIL; // IMAP $config['default_host'] = 'ssl://imap.gmail.com'; $config['default_port'] = 993; $config['imap_auth_type'] = 'LOGIN'; $config['imap_delimiter'] = '/'; // Required if you're running PHP 5.6 or later $config['imap_conn_options'] = array( 'ssl' => array( 'verify_peer' => false, 'verify_peer_name' => false, ), ); // SMTP $config['smtp_server'] = 'ssl://smtp.gmail.com'; $config['smtp_port'] = 587; $config['smtp_user'] = ''; $config['smtp_pass'] = ''; $config['smtp_auth_type'] = 'LOGIN'; // Required if you're running PHP 5.6 or later $config['smtp_conn_options'] = array( 'ssl' => array( 'verify_peer' => false, 'verify_peer_name' => false, ), ); // Use user's identity as envelope sender for 'return receipt' responses, // otherwise it will be rejected by iRedAPD plugin `reject_null_sender`. $config['mdn_use_from'] = true; // SYSTEM $config['force_https'] = false; $config['login_autocomplete'] = 2; $config['ip_check'] = true; $config['des_key'] = 'ysyjjWMLN3VURByePIH5a4gr'; $config['cipher_method'] = 'AES-256-CBC'; $config['useragent'] = 'Roundcube Webmail'; // Hide version number //$config['username_domain'] = 'example.com'; $config['mime_types'] = '/etc/mime.types'; // USER INTERFACE $config['create_default_folders'] = true; $config['quota_zero_as_unlimited'] = true; // USER PREFERENCES $config['default_charset'] = 'UTF-8'; //$config['addressbook_sort_col'] = 'name'; $config['draft_autosave'] = 60; $config['default_list_mode'] = 'threads'; $config['autoexpand_threads'] = 2; $config['check_all_folders'] = true; $config['default_font_size'] = '12pt'; $config['message_show_email'] = true; $config['layout'] = 'widescreen'; // three columns //$config['skip_deleted'] = true; // PLUGINS $config['plugins'] = array('archive', 'zipdownload');
Note that you can replace the IMAP and SMTP connection details appropriately. In this guide, am using gmail as my mail server.
You can as well check our previous article on how to setup a fully fledged mail server with iRedMail on Ubuntu 18.04.
Restart Apache
service apache2 restart
You are now ready to access Roundcube web interface. Navigate to http://roundcube.example.com and log in using your email account’s username and password.
You have successfully install and setup your Roundcube webmail client and you can now be able to accessible you emails normally. In our next tutorial, we will learn how to connect to iRedMail mail server from a remote Roundcube. Enjoy
