Re: Setup instructions for Spamassassin on Ubuntu Server 24.04.4 LTS using Sendmail

Oops - forgot to say must run sendmailconfig  right after step 9

Ted

On 4/16/2026 12:42 AM, Ted Mittelstaedt wrote:
> The following are the steps I used for this.   Every guide I came 
> across to do it was wrong and useless, however this one:
>
> https://oneuptime.com/blog/post/2026-01-15-configure-spamassassin-ubuntu/view 
>
>
> skipping over the beginning (which was all wrong) the info after the 
> section "Custom Rules" is not that terrible.
>
> Note the Linux community almost always reaches for postfix because 
> that is what they know, very few of them use sendmail and often when 
> you see sendmail mentioned it's actually the postfix sendmail stub 
> program not the real sendmail.
>
> With that out of the way:
>
> 1) Install Ubuntu Server and configure to ssh into it, static IP, add 
> name to /etc/hosts, ntp time sync it, set correct timezone, hostname, 
> forward and reverse dns records, setup backups, update, etc.
>
> 2)  apt-get install sendmail
>
> this installs version 8.18.1 of sendmail.
>
> (8.18.2 is the latest version of sendmail)
>
> 3) run the script
>
> sendmailconfig
>
> 4) test local delivery
>
> # /usr/sbin/sendmail tedm
> From: tedm@localhost
> Subject: test
>
> test
> .
>
> cat /var/mail/tedm
> make sure mail is there
>
> 5) Add the IP address on your machines interface you want your machine 
> to receive mail on
>
> cd /etc/mail
> add
> DAEMON_OPTIONS(`Family=inet,  Name=MTA-v4, Port=smtp, 
> Addr=86.75.30.9')dnl
>
> to sendmail.mc
>
> make
>  /etc/init.d/sendmail reload
>
> 6) Test from another host make sure your getting mail
>
> 7) apt install spamassassin
>  systemctl enable spamd
>
> cd /etc/spamassassin
>  cp  local.cf  local.cf.installed
>  vi local.cf
>
> make your configuration changes and save
>
>  systemctl start spamd
>
> 8)  cd /etc/mail
> mkdir -p /etc/mail/spamassassin
>
> vi /etc/mail/spamassassin/spamassassin.m4
>
> Put in:
>
> dnl
> dnl Process mail through spamassassin
> dnl
> define(`confMILTER_MACROS_ENVFROM', `i, {auth_type}, {auth_authen}, 
> {auth_ssf}, {auth_author}, {mail_mailer}, {mail_host}, {mail_addr}, r, 
> b, v, Z')dnl
> define(`confMILTER_MACROS_ENVRCPT', `{auth_type}, r, v, Z')dnl
> INPUT_MAIL_FILTER(`spamassassin', 
> `S=local:/var/run/spamass/spamass.sock, F=, T=C:15m;S:4m;R:4m;E:10m')dnl
>
> 9)  add this template to the main sendmail.mc
> cd /etc/mail
>  cp sendmail.mc sendmail.mc.nospamassassin
>
>  vi sendmail.mc
>
> add:
>
> include(`/etc/mail/spamassassin/spamassassin.m4')dnl
>
> right before MAILER_DEFINITIONS  and save
>
> 10)  install spamass-milter
>
> service spamd stop
>
> apt-get install spamass-milter
>
> cd /etc/default
>
> vi spamass-milter
>
> uncomment and modify:
> SOCKETOWNER="spamass-milter:spamass-milter"
>
> save
>
> systemctl enable spamass-milter
>
> service spamd start
>
>  systemctl start spamass-milter
>
> As of this writing all of the Ubuntu packages install correct 
> config/default files for systemctl and so on
>
> The spamassassin package is version 4.0.2 for this version of Ubuntu:
>
> https://packages.ubuntu.com/noble/spamassassin
>
> The spamass-milter is version 0.4.0
>
> https://packages.ubuntu.com/noble/spamass-milter
>
> Note that the Ubuntu packager modified all of the prefixes.
>
> So just downloading it and compiling the latest version will put it in 
> /usr/local/sbin instead of /usr/sbin and so on for all the other 
> locations.
>
> Ted