Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Email Delivery Integration

• Table of Contents
• Configure SMTP Connection
• Create SMTP Credentials
• Create Email Domain(s)
• Enable Logging
• Setup SPF and DKIM
• Wait for DNS
• Create Approved Sender(s)
• Setup The Relay Server as a Virtual MTA
• OCI Email Delivery Reference

This page is designed to help with the configuration of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) Email Delivery as a relay server with GreenArrow. These steps are specific to OCI Email Delivery and should be executed in addition to the steps required to setup an SMTP relay server

These instructions assume that you have an OCI account administrative access to the OCI console, and that you’ve already created the necessary OCI groups and users for your organization.

Configure SMTP Connection

The SMTP Connection information will include the public endpoint that GreenArrow will connect to for the purposes of submitting messages to relay through OCI Email Delivery. Follow the steps described here and make note of the Public Endpoint hostname and SMTP Ports values there, as you’ll need them later in the process.

Create SMTP Credentials

Because GreenArrow Engine will be passing messages to OCI Email Delivery through SMTP, you will need to create SMTP credentials to use in configuring the VirtualMTA in GreenArrow. Pay particular attention to the note on that screen about copying the username and password immediately, because you won’t be able to retrieve them later, and you’ll need them for the VirtualMTA configuration.

The username and password for these credentials will be generated for you during this step, and they will have no relation to the domains or email addresses you use when relaying mail from GreenArrow through OCI Email Delivery. As an example, the username will look something like this:

ocid1.user.oc1..aaaaaaaavcd6gnbl25lxusjs5drdptmxrixakecweae5i2li3dq2x6ktqdja@ocid1.tenancy.oc1..aaaaaaaa7fxp3cnxub6lnchw2bdv3ptvn92mw2ac67hrp4im7wbzdil2lavq.x9.com

As you can see, such a username is impossible for a human to remember, and since it can’t be retrieved once you’ve left the screen where it’s created, it is imperative that you make a copy of it when it’s created.

Create Email Domain(s)

You will have to create one or more email domains in OCI Email Delivery. These domains should be domains over which you have DNS control, and should be the same domain(s) you’re using when sending from GreenArrow.

Enable Logging

OCI Email Delivery offers some dashboard functionality that’s most useful if logs are enabled for the domain(s) you’ll be using.

Setup SPF and DKIM

You will have to update your SPF record(s) for your domain(s), and the updates to make will depend on the OCI region you’re hosted in.

You should also configure DKIM for your domain(s) and publish the DKIM public key(s) in DNS. This will be required for a subsequent step.

Wait for DNS

After you’ve published your new SPF record and DKIM public key(s), ensure that enough time elapses for the changes to propagate before proceeding. You can do this by periodically querying public DNS resolvers at the following IP addresses for your SPF record(s) and DKIM public key(s):

1.1.1.1
8.8.8.8
8.8.4.4

The time it takes your changes to propagate will depend on the existing TTL of your DNS records.

Create Approved Sender(s)

The last step to using OCI Email Delivery as a relay for GreenArrow is creating Approved Sender(s). An Approved Sender is an email address that must match the address in the RFC5321.From address (a.k.a., the Return-Path) of the message being relayed from GreenArrow to OCI Email Delivery. This address is not the username created in the SMTP Credentials step above.

Each Approved Sender can and should be just an @ sign followed by a domain name that matches a domain that you created during the Create Email Domain(s) step above. That is, if you created the email domain example.com above, then the Approved Sender to create here is @example.com.

This step will only work if the OCI Email Delivery console can verify that you’ve set up DKIM for your domain, hence our reason for instructing you to wait for DNS above.

Setup The Relay Server as a Virtual MTA

Once you’re done with the above, it’s time to return to GreenArrow to configure your relay server.

Step 5 on that page talks about the New Relay Server form, and here are the values from above to use on that form:

• Relay Server (item iv) - the Public Endpoint hostname from the “SMTP Sending Information” section above.
• Port (item v) - one of the port(s) from the SMTP Ports values from the “SMTP Sending Information” section above. Note that you should use port 587 here if at all possible.
• Use SMTP AUTH (item vi) - This box should be checked
• Username (item vii) - The username from the “Create SMTP Credentials” section above
• Password (item viii) - The password from the “Create SMTP Credentials” section above

The rest of the values for this form are specific to your GreenArrow instance.

OCI Email Delivery Reference

This page is intended to give you some pointers as to how to setup GreenArrow Engine to use OCI Email Delivery as a relay server, but it is no substitute for Oracle’s documentation on their Email Delivery product, and you should consult their documentation as the single source of truth for configuring OCI Email Delivery.