Add ssmtp mail

Mail is very useful for sending notifications and text messages about issues on a Raspberry Pi.

Most email clients will block all email from an unknown domain, which is why gmail or some other known domain must be used to forward a Raspberry Pi's email.

The Raspberry Pi needs a Mail Transfer Agent, like sendmail, exim4, or postfix.

Required Parts:

    • Raspberry Pi running raspbian with ssh enabled

Step 3. Install SSMTP and mail utilities

Run the commands:

$ sudo apt-get install ssmtp mailutils -y

Step 4. Edit the SSMTP configuration file

Edit the config file using:

$ sudo nano /etc/ssmtp/ssmtp.conf

as follows:

root=♣your-gmail-account♣@gmail.com

mailhub=smtp.gmail.com:587

hostname=♣your-hostname♣

AuthUser=♣your-gmail-account♣@gmail.com

AuthPass=♣your-gmail-password♣

UseSTARTTLS=YES

Step 5. Edit the SSMTP aliases file

Edit the config file:

$ sudo nano /etc/ssmtp/revaliases

Create one line for each user in your system that will be able to send emails. For example:

root:♣your-gmail-account♣@gmail.com:smtp.gmail.com:587

Step 6. Set the permissions

Set permissions of the SSMTP configuration file:

$ sudo chmod og+x /etc/ssmtp/ssmtp.conf

Step 8. Try it

Get the script:

$ wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dumbo25/send-text-message/main/emailTry.py

Edit the file and put in your values in the angle brackets:

$ nano emailTry.py

Run the script using

$ python emailTry.py

Note:

gmail receives the email and forwards to AT&T immediately. However, delivery of the message to my phone through AT&T (txt.att.net or mms.att.net) is very slow. A text message takes 22 minutes to go through AT&T and be delivered to my phone. I get the same delays whether the email is sent from the Raspberry Pi try.py script or from my gmail account. Using a filter in gmail, seems to eliminate the delay.

I checked my iPhone settings and nothing is blocking or slowing delivery.