Use S3 for email storage?

[Razva]

Hello,

I would like to use a cPanel install only for emails. No HTTP, no FTP, no Ruby etc. Just email.

In order to store email data I would like to use S3 via S3FS*.

So here's the question: should I set the entire /home directory to be stored on S3 (set via WHM -> Home directories to be created) OR only the /mail directory for each user?

Thanks,
Razvan

* Yes, I know that this is not an "officially cPanel supported option" but - considering the implications for other dedicated options like OpenXchange & Zimbra - I cannot find a better solution at this point.

 

[cPanelLauren]

Hello,


cPanel doesn't support NFS mounts for /home and you will encounter issues creating or using the email accounts if this is implemented.

We do note in our installation documentation that we only develop and test cPanel on filesystems that support flock here: cPanel Installation Requirements. I would encourage you to open or vote for the feature request that is present at features.cpanel.net when it is no longer undergoing maintenance.

 

[Razva]

cPanel doesn't support NFS mounts for /home and you will encounter issues creating or using the email accounts if this is implemented.

I'm fully aware that cPanel doesn't supports NFS mounts, but can you please let me know what could be the possible consequences for such a scenario, especially when for the "mail" folder which doesn't has any symlinks and - in theory - doesn't continuously write logs?

I'm willing to take a risk, but before doing so I want to be aware of the implications.

Thank you!

 

[cPanelLauren]

Hi @Razva

it's possible if you create this you won't be able to create or use email accounts. Since you're planning on doing this strictly for email I don't believe this solution would work for you.

 

[Razva]

it's possible if you create this you won't be able to create or use email accounts. Since you're planning on doing this strictly for email I don't believe this solution would work for you.

Yeah that would really be a bad thing.

Can you please provide some minimum information about this and why/what could go wrong? I'm ready to dig deeper into this, but in order to do so I need a starting point.

 

[cPanelLauren]

The inability to create email accounts is a historical example. Because we don't test or develop cPanel on filesystems that don't support flock I don't have a live example ready for you. I can direct you to some other threads which have asked similar questions:

Mount Home2 NFS
Adding server /nfs/xxxx mounted folder to public_html/
Horizontal scaling of a cPanel server using NFS for home

This might at least give you a good starting point to see the issues others have experienced.