Client side OOF with Postfix and Thunderbird

Most MTAs don’t have out of office functionality. To achieve this you need to use a 3rd party tool. It must seamlessly integrate with the mail transport agent and give the possibility to change status for each user. An administrator should be able to manage all users’ out of office states.

For example, you have 50 employees in the company, each user has a mailbox on Postfix or Zimbra. None of these mail servers provide out of office states manageable by users. Users cannot change their OOF status when they go on vacation, and their manager cannot do it for them either.

The application which will provide this functionality, MSH Out of Office Assistant, is a milter application that extends mail transfer agents and mail clients, like Thunderbird.

How it works?

You need to install server side module on Postfix. With administrator panel you’re able to create custom Thunderbird extension. Next send it to users, they should install with mail client. The plugin is preconfigured, so it doesn’t need any adjustments.

These three steps are sufficient to setup environment with out of office functionality.

To learn more visit MSH Postfix Autoresponder website.