[PLUG] E-mail server?

[drew wymore]

> If I were to start my own ISP, I wouldn't put anyone on random
> ip addresses.  Everybody would be static, but I'd offer dhcp
> service and a web interface to allow customers to configure
> it that want to use it.  I'd also provide dns service standard
> for those who don't want to do dns on their own servers.  The
> trick, keep intentional ip misconfigurations from interfering
> with other customers.  Instead of an email service, customers
> do their own email servers and they can forward to a filtering
> server that I provide for them if they want it.
>
>      Michael C. Robinson


On the topic of email I heard through the grapevine that Gmail is going to
offer the ability to get email from any account from within the Gmail
interface in the near future so that could resolve all your problems right
there.

<tangent about DHCP versus static>


I've worked for several ISP's and currently a telecom provider and  static
is just not feasible in the long run if you want to scale to anything larger
then a small mom and pop operation (not that there is anything wrong with
that).

>From a managment standpoint DHCP is much easier but requires more upfront
work (DHCP server, Accounting/Radius). If you're using a static setup you
risk having only roughly 63 customers per /24 subnet (depending on how its
engineered) so you're looking at additional cost as you grow because you're
paying someone to submit applications to ARIN for new subnets as well as
paying the registration fee's. Of course if you go DHCP then you have to
deal with things like the MPAA and RIAA complaints and being able to
accurately correlate authentication and IP data to a specific account which
takes time and money :-)

This idea could be argued for ever and ever but I guess comes down to the
time and money and engineering you want to put into a network

</tangent>