Forward Email

Forward Email is an open-source email service designed for privacy and custom domain management. It functions as both a web application and a server-side utility, allowing users to manage how mail is routed and stored for their own domains. The software provides the necessary infrastructure to handle email traffic without relying on centralized proprietary providers.

The software is deployed as a suite of interconnected services including a web interface, a dedicated API, and various mail protocol handlers. It can be hosted on Ubuntu or macOS environments and utilizes a distributed architecture to handle different aspects of email communication. Users can deploy the system to manage everything from simple message forwarding to full mail server capabilities for multiple custom domains.

Key features

• Encrypted email forwarding for custom domains
• SMTP server for sending emails
• IMAP and POP3 support for mail retrieval
• CalDAV and CardDAV integration for calendars and contacts
• SQLite integration for data management
• Web-based management interface
• API for programmatic service control
• Ansible playbooks for automated server provisioning

The system architecture is built on Node.js and requires MongoDB and Redis for data storage and caching. It is designed for developers and privacy-conscious users who want to maintain full control over their email infrastructure. The deployment process is structured to support high availability, utilizing geo-located load balancing and PM2 for process management on Ubuntu LTS servers. For local development, the software provides a set of pre-built commands to launch individual services such as the MX, SMTP, and IMAP servers on specific ports for testing with clients like Thunderbird.

This software provides a complete set of mail server capabilities focused on encrypted communication and domain-level forwarding.