smtp settings confusion

Hi, I have been trying to get through smtp settings configuration successfully to give my web app the ability to send users account verification emails automatically after they sign up.

TL/DR I have gotten it working.. but still confused about a few things and hoping for clarity 🙂

I noticed that there are a ton of different places to set SMTP related settings in appwrite self hosted:

1) 2 different places in the docker-compose.yml (I believe one is for messaging?)

2) in the .env for appwrite

3) in the appwrite console under project settings -> Custom SMTP

4) in the appwrite console -> messaging

I've settled on the understanding that for what I need, I want to configure the general system SMTP, which is under project settings (please correct me if I have any of this wrong!)

I've also been testing my configuration with docker exec appwrite doctor which has always every single time returned SMTP.....disconnected.

I have also been recreating my containers after changes FYI using docker compose up -d --force-recreate

I only just now got it to work .. using a combination of settings I found that works for my host (bluehost)

_APP_SMTP_HOST=my-domain.com
_APP_SMTP_PORT=465
_APP_SMTP_SECURE=ssl
_APP_SMTP_USERNAME=noreply@my-domain.com
_APP_SMTP_PASSWORD=<PASS>

but even when I successfully had the backend send a verification email, the appwrite doctor command still returns SMTP disconnected.

so I wanted to flag this as a potential bug, but also wanted to know if there was some clarity on which settings in the UI we can use, and do those supersede the .env settings? or something else?

why do the UI settings exist if so many people suggest doing it in the .env?

Thanks!