Other Useful
Information
We can set up SpamAssassin for you with a minimum of fuss:
- if you don't forward your E-mail elsewhere;
- if you don't already use another server-based E-mail
filter
(if you don't know what this means, you probably don't);
and
- if your IMAP E-mail client is configured correctly to
use your "
mail" sub-directory to store your E-mail.
If one or more of these conditions is not true, we can
still set up
SpamAssassin for you, but we will have to consult with you about the
procedure for handling the exception(s).
When SpamAssassin is set up in its default mode, you will
have three additional "Inbox"-type E-mail folders:
IN.probable-spam
(messages which have some characteristics of spam
E-mail) IN.spam
(messages which have even more characteristics
of spam E-mail) IN.probable-virus
(messages with certain characteristics of known
E-mail-carried viruses)
There is some overlap between the characteristics sought
for
to signal virus content and those which signal spam, so some spam
messages may end up in the IN.probable-virus folder, and
some viruses may end up in one of the spam folders.
No filter is perfect, so some
spam will still end up in your Inbox. Looking at it in
"full headers" mode, you will see an "X-Spam-Status:" header containing
the score assigned to it by SpamAssassin when trying to decide
spam/non-spam. Some spammers
intentionally aim for making their spam messages look as much as
possible like ordinary
E-mail, and sometimes they succeed. SpamAssassin does have "learning"
capabilities,
so some messages which are not caught when you first start using it
would be caught later on (more on this in FAQ #3 - see the Links
section, below).
Some desired E-mail (usually from mailing lists or
from companies with which you have wanted
dealings) may end up classified in one of the spam folders.
SpamAssassin has a "whitelist" capability to cause SpamAssassin to not
count messages from known senders (on the list) as spam. This will be
described in FAQ #4. When it is written, a link will appear on this
FAQ.