📮 A fully featured open source mail delivery platform for incoming & outgoing e-mail
This report summarizes scanner evidence for postalserver/postal, a Ruby project with 16,859 GitHub stars. SynthScan examined 29,281 lines of code across 369 source files, recording 126 pattern matches distributed across 5 syntactic categories. The legacy adjusted pattern signal is 5.2 (Moderate pattern signal); it is not an authorship estimate.
Use the findings to ask whether maintainers can explain intent, verify dependencies, simplify unnecessary scaffolding, and focus review effort. Risk Payload v1 adds ownership, supply-chain, over-engineering, and review-effort vectors when available. These are prompts for human verification, not probabilities, security findings, or measured maintenance costs.
Use each vector to guide manual verification of the underlying findings.
Can maintainers explain intent, assumptions, and trade-offs? 122 finding(s).
Are imports declared and package/API names verified? 4 finding(s).
Are wrappers, guards, and repeated structures necessary? 22 finding(s).
Which changes need focused human review? 126 finding(s).
This chart tracks the legacy adjusted pattern score across scan runs. Changes can reflect source changes, scan coverage, or detector/scoring versions; they do not measure AI adoption or prove that a team refactored code. Compare runs only when their scoring versions are compatible. The dashed line tracks the raw pattern-hit count.
Groups findings by configured severity weight. Severity is not a confidence estimate, security rating, or proof that a package is missing. Verify imports against the project's manifests and inspect each finding in its local design context.
This horizontal bar chart shows where configured pattern scores accumulate across directories. Treat the bars as locations to inspect, not as evidence of authorship or code quality. Use the file-level findings to decide whether a directory needs a focused ownership, dependency, complexity, or review check.
The scanner identified 126 distinct pattern matches across 5 syntactic categories. Each entry below represents a discrete location in the source code where the engine recorded a detector match to inspect in context. Expand any category row to inspect the individual file paths, line numbers, code snippets, and the lexical context (CODE, COMMENT, or STRING) in which each match was detected.
Reading the findings table: The Severity column indicates the configured finding weight (CRITICAL / HIGH / MEDIUM / LOW). The Context column identifies whether the match occurred inside executable code, an inline comment, or a string literal — legacy comment-context matches receive a ×1.5 score weight. The ⚡ bolt icon marks clustered matches: three or more patterns within a 10-line window, each receiving an additional ×1.5 density multiplier under the legacy scoring model.
| Severity | File | Line | Snippet | Context |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| LOW | .rubocop.yml | 21 | # There should always be empty lines inside a class. For example | COMMENT |
| LOW | .rubocop.yml | 101 | Lint/BooleanSymbol: | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/user_invite.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/organization_user.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/track_domain.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/credential.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/smtp_endpoint.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/ip_address.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/ip_pool_rule.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/address_endpoint.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/http_endpoint.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/webhook_event.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/worker_role.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/organization.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/route.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/queued_message.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/webhook.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/ip_pool.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/webhook_request.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/domain.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/domain.rb | 21 | # return_path_error :string(255) | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/organization_ip_pool.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/scheduled_task.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/server.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/server.rb | 21 | # send_limit :integer | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/user.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/additional_route_endpoint.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/models/concerns/has_locking.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/senders/smtp_sender.rb | 161 | # Return an array of server hostnames which should receive this message | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/lib/worker/process.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/controllers/legacy_api/messages_controller.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/controllers/legacy_api/base_controller.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/controllers/legacy_api/send_controller.rb | 21 | # | COMMENT |
| LOW | app/assets/config/manifest.js | 1 | //= link_tree ../images | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/locales/en.yml | 1 | # Files in the config/locales directory are used for internationalization | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/environments/production.rb | 21 | config.public_file_server.enabled = true | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/environments/development.rb | 41 | COMMENT | |
| LOW | config/initializers/application_controller_renderer.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/backtrace_silencers.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/mime_types.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/wrap_parameters.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/assets.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/permissions_policy.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/content_security_policy.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/content_security_policy.rb | 21 | # config.content_security_policy_nonce_generator = ->(request) { request.session.id.to_s } | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/inflections.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/new_framework_defaults_7_0.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/new_framework_defaults_7_0.rb | 21 | # Changing this default means invalidate all encrypted messages generated by | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/new_framework_defaults_7_0.rb | 41 | # and asynchronous queries will then be enabled. | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/new_framework_defaults_7_0.rb | 61 | # regardless of whether they have a default or not. | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/new_framework_defaults_7_0.rb | 81 | # | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/new_framework_defaults_7_0.rb | 101 | # and you have no plans to rollback. | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/new_framework_defaults_7_0.rb | 121 | # | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/initializers/new_framework_defaults_7_0.rb | 141 | # See https://guides.rubyonrails.org/configuring.html#config-active-support-disable-to-s-conversion for more information | COMMENT |
| LOW | spec/models/server_spec.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | spec/models/server_spec.rb | 21 | # send_limit :integer | COMMENT |
| LOW | spec/models/queued_message_spec.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | spec/models/organization_spec.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | spec/models/domain_spec.rb | 1 | # frozen_string_literal: true | COMMENT |
| LOW | spec/models/domain_spec.rb | 21 | # return_path_error :string(255) | COMMENT |
| 25 more matches not shown… | ||||
| Severity | File | Line | Snippet | Context |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MEDIUM | app/senders/smtp_sender.rb | 212 | # Create a new result object | COMMENT |
| MEDIUM | app/lib/smtp_server/server.rb | 102 | # Create a hash to contain a buffer for each client. | COMMENT |
| MEDIUM | config/initializers/wrap_parameters.rb | 5 | # This file contains settings for ActionController::ParamsWrapper which | COMMENT |
| MEDIUM | config/initializers/permissions_policy.rb | 2 | # Define an application-wide HTTP permissions policy. For further | COMMENT |
| MEDIUM | config/initializers/content_security_policy.rb | 4 | # Define an application-wide content security policy. | COMMENT |
| MEDIUM | lib/postal/signer.rb | 7 | # Create a new Signer | COMMENT |
| MEDIUM | lib/postal/message_db/provisioner.rb | 55 | # Create a new table | COMMENT |
| MEDIUM | lib/postal/message_db/message.rb | 351 | # Create a new item in the message queue for this message | COMMENT |
| MEDIUM | lib/postal/message_db/message.rb | 487 | # Create a new link | COMMENT |
| MEDIUM | lib/postal/message_db/database.rb | 62 | # Create a new message with the given attributes. This won't be saved to the database | COMMENT |
| MEDIUM | db/schema.rb | 1 | # This file is auto-generated from the current state of the database. Instead | COMMENT |
| MEDIUM | db/schema.rb | 5 | # This file is the source Rails uses to define your schema when running `bin/rails | COMMENT |
| Severity | File | Line | Snippet | Context |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| LOW⚡ | app/util/has_prometheus_metrics.rb | 5 | def register_prometheus_counter(name, **kwargs) | CODE |
| LOW⚡ | app/util/has_prometheus_metrics.rb | 10 | def register_prometheus_histogram(name, **kwargs) | CODE |
| LOW⚡ | app/util/has_prometheus_metrics.rb | 15 | def increment_prometheus_counter(name, labels: {}) | CODE |
| LOW⚡ | app/util/has_prometheus_metrics.rb | 22 | def observe_prometheus_histogram(name, time, labels: {}) | CODE |
| LOW | app/mailers/app_mailer.rb | 18 | def server_send_limit_approaching(server) | CODE |
| LOW | app/mailers/app_mailer.rb | 23 | def server_send_limit_exceeded(server) | CODE |
| LOW | app/models/server.rb | 223 | def authenticated_domain_for_address(address) | CODE |
| LOW | app/models/server.rb | 251 | def find_authenticated_domain_from_headers(headers) | CODE |
| LOW | app/models/concerns/has_authentication.rb | 29 | def authenticate_with_previous_password_first(unencrypted_password) | CODE |
| LOW | app/senders/smtp_sender.rb | 87 | def send_message_to_smtp_client(raw_message, mail_from, rcpt_to, retry_on_connection_error: true) | CODE |
| LOW | app/senders/smtp_sender.rb | 139 | def determine_mail_from_for_message(message) | CODE |
| LOW | app/senders/smtp_sender.rb | 155 | def determine_rcpt_to_for_message(message) | CODE |
| LOW | app/controllers/application_controller.rb | 50 | def redirect_to_with_return_to(url, *args) | CODE |
| LOW | app/helpers/application_helper.rb | 28 | def domain_options_for_select(server, selected_domain = nil, options = {}) | CODE |
| LOW | app/helpers/application_helper.rb | 53 | def endpoint_options_for_select(server, selected_value = nil, options = {}) | CODE |
| LOW | spec/helpers/general_helpers.rb | 5 | def create_plain_text_message(server, text, to = "test@example.com", override_attributes = {}) | CODE |
| LOW | lib/tracking_middleware.rb | 61 | def dispatch_redirect_request(request, server_token, link_token) | CODE |
| LOW | lib/tracking_middleware.rb | 101 | def get_message_db_from_server_token(token) | CODE |
| LOW | lib/postal/config_schema.rb | 631 | def substitute_config_file_root(string) | CODE |
| LOW | lib/postal/config.rb | 150 | def change_database_connection_pool_size(new_size) | CODE |
| LOW | lib/postal/message_db/provisioner.rb | 114 | def remove_raw_tables_older_than(max_age = 30) | CODE |
| LOW | lib/postal/message_db/provisioner.rb | 147 | def remove_raw_tables_until_less_than_size(size) | CODE |
| Severity | File | Line | Snippet | Context |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| LOW | app/lib/smtp_server/server.rb | 171 | # Increment prometheus | COMMENT |
| LOW | config/environments/production.rb | 58 | # Set this to true and configure the email server for immediate delivery to raise delivery errors. | COMMENT |
| LOW | lib/postal/message_db/message.rb | 529 | # Return the result | COMMENT |
| Severity | File | Line | Snippet | Context |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| LOW | spec/models/domain_spec.rb | 360 | "admin@example.com", | CODE |
| LOW | spec/models/user_spec.rb | 95 | expect(user.name).to eq "John Doe" | CODE |
| LOW | spec/factories/organization_factory.rb | 28 | name { "Acme Inc" } | CODE |
| LOW | spec/lib/smtp_server/client/data_spec.rb | 64 | expect(client.headers["from"]).to eq ["test@test.com"] | CODE |