Local only sendmail that delivers all mail to a directory

Question

I have a development Ubuntu Server (12.04.1) VM that I use to develop php sites and e-commerce sites (like Magento etc).

Because this is for development purposes, and I need to test with e-mail addresses other than my own, I need a way for the sendmail command to accept a mail but not actually deliver it, but rather archive is somewhere where I can look at it.

What is the easiest way to install a mail server such that the sendmail command routes ALL mail to a local directory? i.e. I do NOT want any mail to be delivered to the internet.

I tried the steps discussed in this question ( SMTP server to deliver ALL mail to user@localhost), but it doesn't seem to work - I get an error message in my (local) mailbox telling me that it cannot deliver my test message (e.g. someone@gmail.com)

Answer 1

To answer my own question, using postfix this is possible. You have to do two things:

1. Add the configuration options discussed in SMTP server to deliver ALL mail to user@localhost, add the following to your /etc/postfix/main.cf file:

   luser_relay = MYLOCALUSER@localhost
   local_recipient_maps =
   

2. Using the following answer on serverfault ( http://serverfault.com/questions/133190/host-wildcard-subdomains-using-postfix), I added the following (note that you need the postfix-pcre package installed):

   In /etc/postfix/main.cf:

    mydestination = pcre:/etc/postfix/mydestinations
   

   In /etc/postfix/mydestinations

   /.*/         ACCEPT
   

This will deliver ALL mail that postfix handles to the configured local user defined in #1, so don't use this for anything other than development.