Install Jentic One Beta

Connect the Mail-in-a-Box to your agent

Jentic One is a self-hosted execution layer for AI agents. It lets your agent call the Mail-in-a-Box, or any other public or private API you need. You set the rules, the agent never sees your credentials, and every call is logged.

Two steps, two machines. Install the instance in a safe environment, then register your agent from wherever it runs.

Step 1: Jentic One Host machine

# On the machine that will host your Jentic One instance:
curl -fsSL "https://jentic.com/install.sh?src=apis&api=%2Fapis%2Fmailinabox.email%2Fmailinabox" | sh

Step 2: Agent machine

# On the machine where your agent runs (keep this separate from the instance):
curl -fsSL "https://jentic.com/install.sh?src=apis&api=%2Fapis%2Fmailinabox.email%2Fmailinabox" | sh
jentic register       # connects your agent to your Jentic One instance

Jentic One is in public beta. The setup above keeps your agent separate from the instance, which is what you want before using real credentials: an agent running as the same OS user as Jentic One can read its stored keys directly. Just evaluating? A single local install is fine to start. See the secure deployment guide for the tiers.

Capabilities

What an agent can do with Mail-in-a-Box API.

Add, remove, and set passwords for mail users on a Mail-in-a-Box server

Grant or revoke admin privileges through the user-privileges endpoints

Manage DNS custom A, MX, TXT, and other records on hosted zones

Provision or install SSL certificates for hosted domains

Trigger system package updates and reboot the box from the API

GET STARTED

Start building with Mail-in-a-Box API

Explore with Jentic One

View OpenAPI Document

Use Cases

Patterns agents use Mail-in-a-Box API for, with concrete tasks.

★ Self-Hosted Mail User Provisioning

Provision and deprovision mail users on a self-hosted Mail-in-a-Box server through the admin API rather than the web console. Endpoints under /mail/users cover add, remove, password reset, and privilege grant operations, which lets a small team or homelab manage its mail server from CI or a chat-ops bot. Each call uses HTTP Basic against the admin endpoint at /admin.

POST /mail/users/add with email=alice@example.com and password set to a generated value, then POST /mail/users/privileges/add to grant admin if needed.

DNS and SSL Lifecycle

Manage DNS records and SSL certificates for the domains hosted on a Mail-in-a-Box without leaving the API. The /dns/custom endpoints support add, update, and remove for any record type while /ssl/provision triggers Let's Encrypt provisioning across the hosted domains. POST /dns/update applies pending DNS changes to the live nameserver.

POST /ssl/provision to provision certificates, then GET /ssl/status to confirm every hosted domain has a current certificate.

System Maintenance Automation

Automate routine maintenance on a small fleet of Mail-in-a-Box instances by calling /system/status to gather health, /system/updates to identify pending package updates, and /system/update-packages to apply them. The /system/reboot endpoints schedule a controlled reboot when kernel updates require it.

Call POST /system/status, then if the response flags pending updates, POST /system/update-packages and confirm completion with GET /system/version.

Agent-Driven Mail Server Operations

An AI agent can run end-to-end Mail-in-a-Box operations through Jentic: add a new user, provision an SSL cert, and update the backup config in one chained workflow. The basic-auth credentials live in your Jentic One instance and the agent works against the published admin endpoints without ever seeing the raw password.

Add a new mail user via POST /mail/users/add, set their password through POST /mail/users/password, and confirm the addition by checking GET /mail/users.

Key Endpoints

49 endpoints — mail-in-a-box is an open-source self-hosted mail server that bundles smtp, imap, webmail, dns, and tls into a single ubuntu install.

METHOD

PATH

DESCRIPTION

POST

/mail/users/add

Add a mail user

POST

/mail/users/password

Set a mail user password

POST

/dns/custom/{qname}/{rtype}

Add a custom DNS record

POST

/ssl/provision

Provision SSL certificates via Let's Encrypt

POST

/system/update-packages

Update system packages

GET

/system/status

Get full system status

POST

/login

Exchange username and password for a session API key

POST

/mail/users/add

Add a mail user

POST

/mail/users/password

Set a mail user password

POST

/dns/custom/{qname}/{rtype}

Add a custom DNS record

POST

/ssl/provision

Provision SSL certificates via Let's Encrypt

POST

/system/update-packages

Update system packages

GET

/system/status

Get full system status

POST

/login

Exchange username and password for a session API key

Why Jentic?

What agents get from Jentic-routed access to this vendor.

Setup

Wiring Mail-in-a-Box by hand means encoding its HTTP basic credentials, pointing at your own {host}/admin server, and stitching together its mail, DNS, and SSL admin endpoints yourself. Through Jentic you install once, import Mail-in-a-Box from the API Directory, store the credentials once, and your agent calls it.

Permission scoping

Mail-in-a-Box drives account and system changes through admin operations, so limit the agent to the operations it needs, such as reading system status, and leave changes like adding a mail user or updating packages out unless you add them. The operation set is your choice.

Credential isolation

Your Mail-in-a-Box credentials are stored once, encrypted, by your own Jentic One instance and injected at execution time. They never enter the agent's prompt, logs, or context.

Intent-based discovery

Agents search Jentic by intent such as 'add a mail user' or 'check server status', and Jentic returns the matching Mail-in-a-Box operation with its input schema so the agent calls the right endpoint without browsing the reference docs.

FAQs

Specific to using Mail-in-a-Box API through Jentic.

What authentication does the Mail-in-a-Box API use?

Mail-in-a-Box uses HTTP Basic authentication via the basicAuth scheme. If MFA is enabled, supply a one-time password in the x-auth-token header alongside Basic credentials. POST /login returns a session API key that can replace the password on subsequent calls. Through Jentic the credentials are stored encrypted in the vault.

Can I add mail users through the API?

Yes. POST /mail/users/add creates a new mail user with email and password fields, and POST /mail/users/privileges/add grants admin rights. POST /mail/users/password resets the password for an existing user, and POST /mail/users/remove deletes the account.

What are the rate limits for the Mail-in-a-Box API?

Mail-in-a-Box is self-hosted, so admin throughput is bounded by the resources of the box itself rather than a vendor-imposed rate limit. The OpenAPI spec does not declare a per-second cap. Long-running operations such as /system/update-packages should be polled rather than retried aggressively.

How do I provision an SSL certificate through Jentic?

Search Jentic for "provision ssl mail in a box" to load POST /ssl/provision, then execute against your admin host. Follow up with GET /ssl/status to confirm a current certificate is in place for every hosted domain.

Is Mail-in-a-Box free?

Yes. Mail-in-a-Box is open-source software released under CC0. There is no licence fee - you only pay for the VPS or hardware that runs the box and any domain or DNS costs.

Can I trigger DNS updates from the API?

Yes. POST /dns/update applies pending DNS changes to the live nameserver, and the /dns/custom endpoints add, update, or remove individual records. Use GET /dns/dump to inspect the full zonefile state for debugging.

Can I limit what my agent is allowed to do with the Mail-in-a-Box API?

Yes. Because Jentic One is self-hosted, your own rules decide which Mail-in-a-Box operations and credentials the agent may use. You can allow read-only calls like GET /system/status while leaving out account and system changes such as POST /mail/users/add or POST /system/update-packages unless you explicitly add them. The operation set the agent can call is entirely your choice.

Mailinabox Email Mail-in-a-Box

Name: Mail-in-a-Box API
Brand: Mail-in-a-Box
Availability: InStock

Official vendor OpenAPI document · agent-readyDeveloper ToolsMonitoring Observabilitybasic49 EndpointsREST

For Agents

Administer a self-hosted Mail-in-a-Box server through 49 endpoints - manage mail users, DNS records, SSL certificates, system updates, and backups without SSHing into the box.

Use for: Add the mail user alice@example.com to my Mail-in-a-Box server, Set a new password for the user bob@example.com, Remove the mail user spam@example.com from the box, Provision a Let's Encrypt SSL certificate for mail.example.com

Not supported: Does not send transactional email, run marketing campaigns, or expose a public IMAP API - use for Mail-in-a-Box server administration only.

Mail-in-a-Box is an open-source self-hosted mail server that bundles SMTP, IMAP, webmail, DNS, and TLS into a single Ubuntu install. The admin API exposes 49 endpoints for managing mail users and aliases, DNS zones and custom records, SSL certificates, system status and updates, and backups. Authentication is HTTP Basic with optional MFA via the x-auth-token header.

Jentic One on Github View OpenAPI Document

Connect the Mail-in-a-Box to your agent

Capabilities

Start building with Mail-in-a-Box API

Use Cases

Key Endpoints

Why Jentic?

Related APIs

FAQs

Mailinabox Email Mail-in-a-Box