Zimbra Collaboration Suite (ZCS) is a free and Open Source collaborative platform for email servers. It offers services like LDAP, SMTP, POP and IMAP, webmail client, calendaring, tasks, antivirus and antispam. The main objective of this tutorial is to explain how to install Zimbra mail server / Collaboration Suite Open Source Edition on a CentOS/RHEL 7 server.

prerequisites

Before we get started, here are a few things that are required before we proceed with the installation.

  • A clean installation of Centos 7
  • A Fully Qualified Domain (FQDN) for your server
  • A DNS server with both A and MX records for your server

Initial server setup

Add file /etc/hosts

To get started we need to configure a hostname for our server and a static IP address.

vi /etc/hosts

install Zimbra mail server

Disable Selinux

Next, we’ll disable SELinux. To check the status of SELinux, run the command below

getenforce

Output

enforcing

To change from enforcing to disabled take the following steps

vim /etc/selinux/config

Change SELinux from enforcing to disabled as shown

Install zimbra mail server

Disable Unwanted Services

A CentOS 7 default installation ships with postfix daemon already installed and running. To disable and erase postfix service run the following commands:

systemctl stop postfix
systemctl disable postfix

Install extra packages

Next, install some prerequisite packages

yum -y install unzip net-tools sysstat openssh-clients perl-core libaio nmap-ncat libstdc++.so.6 wget libreoffice-headless libreoffice bind-utils

Reboot server

At this point, reboot the system.

reboot

Install Zimbra Collaboration Suite Open Source Edition

Thereafter, create a new directory where we are going to download the Zimbra tarball.

mkdir zimbra_dir
cd zimbra_dir

Download the Zimbra tarball

wget https://files.zimbra.com/downloads/8.8.8_GA/zcs-8.8.8_GA_2009.RHEL7_64.20180322150747.tgz

This will take about 10 minutes.

Output

--2018-05-17 14:14:47-- https://files.zimbra.com/downloads/8.8.8_GA/zcs-8.8.8_GA_2009.RHEL7_64.20180322150747.tgz
Resolving files.zimbra.com (files.zimbra.com)... 52.84.102.218
Connecting to files.zimbra.com (files.zimbra.com)|52.84.102.218|:443... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: 374641820 (357M) [binary/octet-stream]
Saving to: ‘zcs-NETWORK-8.8.8_GA_2009.RHEL7_64.20180322150747.tgz’

100%[=============================================================================================>] 374,641,820 867KB/s in 10m 13s

2018-05-17 14:25:03 (596 KB/s) - ‘zcs-8.8.8_GA_2009.RHEL7_64.20180322150747.tgz’ saved [374641820/374641820]

After downloading , extract the compressed file

tar -xvf zcs-8.8.8_GA_2009.RHEL7_64.20180322150747.tgz

cd to the extracted folder

cd zcs-8.8.8_GA_2009.RHEL7_64.20180322150747

Run the intall.h script

./install.sh --platform--override

You’ll be presented with a text based wizard.

Operations logged to /tmp/install.log.luSct9Pm
Checking for existing installation...
    zimbra-chat...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-drive...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-imapd...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-network-modules-ng...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-rpost...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-ldap...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-logger...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-mta...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-dnscache...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-snmp...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-store...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-apache...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-spell...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-convertd...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-memcached...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-proxy...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-archiving...NOT FOUND
    zimbra-core...NOT FOUND
IMPORTANT-READ CAREFULLY: THE TERMS OF THIS END USER LICENSE AGREEMENT ("EULA") WILL GOVERN YOUR USE OF THE SOFTWARE. BY DOWNLOADING, INSTALLING, OR USING THE SOFTWARE, YOU (THE INDIVIDUAL OR LEGAL ENTITY) ARE (1) REPRESENTING THAT YOU ARE OVER THE AGE OF 18 AND HAVE THE CAPACITY AND AUTHORITY TO BIND YOURSELF OR THE LEGAL ENTITY, AS APPLICABLE, TO THE TERMS OF THIS EULA AND (2) AGREEING ON BEHALF OF YOURSELF AND/OR AS AN AUTHORIZED REPRESENTATIVE OF THE LEGAL ENTITY, AS APPLICABLE, TO BE BOUND BY THIS EULA. IF YOU DO NOT AGREE TO THE TERMS OF THIS EULA, YOU MUST NOT DOWNLOAD, INSTALL, OR USE THE SOFTWARE.

Select “y” on the two EULA and license agreement questions.

The parties acknowledge and agree that a material breach of this
Agreement adversely affecting Autonomy's proprietary rights would cause
irreparable harm to Autonomy for which a remedy at law would be inadequate and
that Autonomy shall be entitled to injunctive relief in addition to any
remedies it may have hereunder or at law.
Do you agree with the terms of the software license agreement? [N]y
    Use Zimbra's package repository [Y] y
    Importing Zimbra GPG key
    Configuring package repository
    Checking for installable packages
    Found zimbra-core (local)
    Found zimbra-ldap (local)
    Found zimbra-logger (local)
    Found zimbra-mta (local)
    Found zimbra-dnscache (local)
    Found zimbra-snmp (local)
    Found zimbra-store (local)
    Found zimbra-apache (local)
    Found zimbra-spell (local)
    Found zimbra-convertd (local)
    Found zimbra-memcached (repo)
    Found zimbra-proxy (local)
    Found zimbra-archiving (local)
    Found zimbra-chat (repo)
    Found zimbra-drive (repo)
    Found zimbra-imapd (local)
    Found zimbra-network-modules-ng (local)

In this blog, we are going to install all packages except the convertd, chat , drive , imapd and network-modules-ngand, which are still in beta:

Select the packages to install
Install zimbra-ldap [Y] 
Install zimbra-logger [Y] 
Install zimbra-mta [Y] 
Install zimbra-dnscache [Y] 
Install zimbra-snmp [Y] 
Install zimbra-store [Y] 
Install zimbra-apache [Y] 
Install zimbra-spell [Y] 
Install zimbra-convertd [Y] n
Install zimbra-memcached [Y] 
Install zimbra-proxy [Y] 
Install zimbra-archiving [N] 
Install zimbra-chat [Y] n
Install zimbra-drive [Y] n
Install zimbra-imapd (BETA - for evaluation only) [N] n
Install zimbra-network-modules-ng [Y] n

Press “y” to allow modification of the system:

The system will be modified.  Continue? [N] Y
Beginning Installation - see /tmp/install.log.luSct9Pm for details...
                          zimbra-core-components will be downloaded and installed.
                            zimbra-timezone-data will be installed.
                    zimbra-common-mbox-conf-msgs will be installed.
                           zimbra-common-mbox-db will be installed.
                         zimbra-common-mbox-conf will be installed.
                   zimbra-common-mbox-native-lib will be installed.
                         zimbra-common-mbox-docs will be installed.
                   zimbra-common-mbox-conf-attrs will be installed.
                  zimbra-common-mbox-conf-rights will be installed.
                                     zimbra-core will be installed.......

This is another hot step. You need to select yes to change the domain and select your own instead mail.admnote.com, just admnote.com

    DNS ERROR resolving MX for mail.admnote.com
    It is suggested that the domain name have an MX record configured in DNS
    Change domain name? [Yes] Y
    Create domain: [mail.admnote.com] admnote.com
    ....
    done.
    Checking for port conflicts

You need to change the admin password by pressing the number 6 (zimbra-store) and then number 4 on the submenu:

Main menu
   1) Common Configuration:                                                  
   2) zimbra-ldap:                             Enabled                       
   3) zimbra-logger:                           Enabled                       
   4) zimbra-mta:                              Enabled                       
   5) zimbra-snmp:                             Enabled                       
   6) zimbra-store:                            Enabled                       
   7) zimbra-spell:                            Enabled                       
   8) zimbra-convertd:                         Enabled                       
   9) zimbra-proxy:                            Enabled                       
  10) Default Class of Service Configuration:                                
  11) Enable default backup schedule:          yes                           
   s) Save config to file                                                    
   x) Expand menu                                                            
   q) Quit                                    
*** CONFIGURATION COMPLETE - press 'a' to apply

Press “a” to apply the changes:

Select from menu, or press 'a' to apply config (? - help) a
     .......
     Save configuration data to a file? [Yes]......
     Save config in file: [/opt/zimbra/config.10904]
     Saving config in /opt/zimbra/config.10904...done.

Press “y” to continue:

Operations logged to /tmp/zmsetup.20180111-132052.log
Setting local config values...done.
Initializing core config...Setting up CA...done.
Deploying CA to /opt/zimbra/conf/ca ...done.
Creating SSL zimbra-store certificate...done.
Creating new zimbra-ldap SSL certificate...done.
Creating new zimbra-mta SSL certificate...done.
Creating new zimbra-proxy SSL certificate...done.
Installing mailboxd SSL certificates...done.
Installing MTA SSL certificates...done.
Installing LDAP SSL certificate...done.
Installing Proxy SSL certificate...done.
Initializing ldap...done.
Setting replication password...done.
Setting Postfix password...done.
Setting amavis password...done.
Setting nginx password...done.
Setting BES searcher password...done.
Creating server entry for zcs-886.zimbra.io...done.
Setting Zimbra IP Mode...done.
Saving CA in ldap...done.
Saving SSL Certificate in ldap...done.
Setting spell check URL...done.
Setting service ports on zcs-886.zimbra.io...done.
Setting zimbraFeatureTasksEnabled=TRUE...done.
Setting zimbraFeatureBriefcasesEnabled=TRUE...done.
Checking current setting of zimbraReverseProxyAvailableLookupTargets
Querying LDAP for other mailstores
Searching LDAP for reverseProxyLookupTargets...done.

Press “enter” to finish the installation:

Moving /tmp/zmsetup.20180111-132052.log to /opt/zimbra/log
     Configuration complete - press return to exit 
After successful installation, open your browser and go to the server’s IP address
http://192.168.1.2

install zimbra server

Summing up

In this article, we have taken you the process on how you can install Zimbra mail server. Zimbra mail server is cheap and avoid unnecessary expenditure on software licenses. Give it a try and let us know your thoughts.

Thank you.

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