Ever since Dreamhost moved me to a new server without warning, I’ve been trying to get my custom SpamAssassin install working the way it used to. I’ve finally succeeded, but it hasn’t been easy…
Because of the new infrastructure plan, new email accounts and shell accounts have been completely isolated. I thought that I wouldn’t need to worry about that, since I had an existing account with shell access to my email, and the change was only supposed to apply to new accounts. Unfortunately, I was completely wrong. In the most recent newsletter, Dreamhost was soliciting volunteers to move to their new servers. Less than one day later, I was having numerous issues with email and my web sites, and it dawned on me that they had moved me to new servers without any kind of notification!
After updating my DNS and changing some email client settings, everything was almost back to normal, except for my custom SpamAssassin install, which was completely broken. Getting it working again would entail a convoluted method of forwards, procmail recipes, and filters on Dreamhost’s panel. Read on for further details…