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Configure

An SMTP account describes how Arbiter connects to an SMTP server and what sender identity it uses. The matching policy decides whether sending is allowed and which recipients are permitted.

Bootstrap an account and starter policy:

arbiter-server bootstrap --plugin smtp --account bot

The account file contains deployment-owned connection settings and credentials:

arbiter/account/smtp/bot.yaml
policy: bot_policy
host: ${oc.env:SMTP_BOT_ACCOUNT_HOST}
port: ${oc.env:SMTP_BOT_ACCOUNT_PORT,587}
authenticate: true
username: ${oc.env:SMTP_BOT_ACCOUNT_USERNAME}
password: ${oc.env:SMTP_BOT_ACCOUNT_PASSWORD}
from_email: agent@example.com
from_name: Arbiter
tls: starttls
verify_peer: true

Generated config uses environment variables for deployment-specific connection details. It is still your config: edit the YAML directly when a fixed value is clearer for your deployment.

The policy file contains the sending guardrails:

arbiter/policy/smtp/bot_policy.yaml
recipient_policy:
  allowed_domain_patterns:
    - example.com

limits:
  max_recipients_per_message: 10
  max_messages_per_minute: 5

Account Fields​

  • host, port, tls, and verify_peer define the SMTP transport.
  • authenticate, username, and password define authentication.
  • from_email and from_name define the sender identity.
  • sent_copy.folder optionally names the IMAP Sent folder to use for saved copies.

Agents do not provide or override these fields when sending mail.

Policy Fields​

  • recipient_policy: allow or block recipients and recipient domains.
  • limits: bound recipients per message and sends per minute.
  • idempotency: control the safe retry window for repeated send attempts with the same caller-provided key.
  • sent_copy: enable Sent-copy behavior and choose whether failures warn or fail.

After editing account and policy files, activate the account:

arbiter-server config activate --plugin smtp --account bot

If the account uses new environment variables, update the env file:

arbiter-server env bootstrap