[vox-tech] introduction & debian / mutt / exim question
Mike Simons
vox-tech@lists.lugod.org
Wed, 16 Apr 2003 19:29:40 -0400
--DKU6Jbt7q3WqK7+M
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Disposition: inline
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
On Wed, Apr 16, 2003 at 01:55:07PM -0700, Jonathan McPherson wrote:
> > - What do you see in /var/log/exim ? (check mainlog and paniclog)
>=20
> There's no paniclog, but pieces of mainlog are given elsewhere in this =
=20
> e-mail. =
=20
Good, paniclog log normally means that something was broken about the=20
local config.
> > - When you send email via exim what hostname does it claim to come
> > from?
>=20
> Here are the full headers from the message as received there.=20
[tricity.wsu.edu]=20
> Return-Path: <jam@mnemosyne>
> From: Jonathan McPherson <jamcp@imap.cc>
> Sender: Jonathan McPherson <jam@mnemosyne>
> Reply-to: jamcp@imap.cc
If mail bounces for any reason the bounce message would go to either
jam@mnemosyne or possibly jamcp@imap.cc...=20
- Is the imap.cc a valid addresses? have you checked it?
It's important that the sender be something that mail can bounce back
to... for example when the first box you relay mail though (like pacbell)
accepts the message then, but the final destination (ucdavis) rejects=20
the mail for some silly reason like (the sender address is invalid)...=20
the pacbell has your mail but no way to bounce it back to you... so you
will think the message went out but got dropped.
I don't know the exact order that they are checked... but each of them
should be something that is valid for you. Fix /etc/email-addresses
so that your jam user is jamcp@ucdavis.edu and you should at least get
most bounces. Hopefully you can fix the rest by greping around for
imap.cc in your mutt configuration or home directory.
> > - How static is your external IP address on the DSL line? (zgrep
> > 'local IP' /var/log/messages*)
>=20
> That command doesn't return anything, so I'm guessing my IP is fairly =
=20
> static. I browsed a few of the /var/log/messages* files by hand with =
=20
> less and used /IP to look for anything related -- nothing.. =
=20
zgrep 'local IP' /var/log/messages*
I'm sorry I forgot to point it out... there are two spaces between
local and IP... if you are on a SBC DSL line which uses PPPoE you should
have messages to the effect of
=3D=3D=3D
Apr 5 19:34:22 salomon pppd[341]: local IP address 67.119.24.170
Apr 5 19:34:22 salomon pppd[341]: remote IP address 67.119.27.0
=3D=3D=3D
the following grep may work as well:
zgrep address /var/log/messages* | grep local
=2E.. also I have debug enabled on my local PPPoE session which increases
what is logged if you don't get any reports from that grep that could be
why. I'll have to figure out what else may log the IP address changes.
> > Steps to collect more useful information:
> >=20
> > - Setup your machine so that it sends mail directly,=20
> > - send to your own UCD address
> > - check if it gets through.
> > - check what exim logs say. =20
>=20
> It gets sent, but UCD rejects it for a fairly obvious reason:
>=20
> (message delivered to /var/mail/jam)
> jamcp@ucdavis.edu
> SMTP error from remote mailer after MAIL FROM:<jam@mnemosyne>
> +SIZE=3D1648:
> host smtp.ucdavis.edu [169.237.104.162]: 501 5.1.8 Domain of sender
> +address jam@mnemosyne does not exist
Very good. You didn't state if any of the messages from the three
methods got through. I imagine UCD rejected all three messages... all
related to your From address being bogus... and you would not have
gotten any of the bounces for reasons listed above. The fix above
should help.
> > You should be using pacbell as a relay if they are your ISP.
>=20
> Yep ... I have been. (-:
Good. Just keep in mind you should settle on the pacbell relay once
all this is cleared up... it will maximize who will accept your mail.
(Plenty of sites are rejecting mail from "dialup"/DSL/cable modem sources).
> > I have a SBC DSL line as well but I don't use it to send outbound
> > mail... so I don't have a configuration to send. If something weird
> > is really going on I can get it working here and send the config
> > examples.
>=20
> (1) What should I set the "visible mail name of my system" to in
> eximconfig? My IP address? the name of my ISP's mail server? If the
> former, how do I keep it updated when my DSL switches IP's?
You can use a dynamic DNS provider to advertise a name that resolves
to your IP address at the moment you send email. I'm working on a=20
mini-howto for this so I'm not going to write more here. =20
Check into ez-ipupdate...
You would put this dynamic name in your exim.conf file under settings=20
like qualify_domain and local_domains.
> (2) Do I also need to use the "hostname =3D ..." setting in my
> muttrc? If so, what do I set that to? (I've noticed that
> setting the hostname in muttrc makes a difference in the exim
> log files... "id=3D20030416210129.GA3083@mnemosyne" becomes
> "id=3D20030416210129.GA3083@mail.pacbell.net" for instance.
I recommend you not set hostname. The email-addresses method above
will fix more things.
Let me know how the change above works,
Mike Simons
--=20
GPG key: http://simons-clan.com/~msimons/gpg/msimons.asc
--DKU6Jbt7q3WqK7+M
Content-Type: application/pgp-signature
Content-Disposition: inline
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.0.6 (GNU/Linux)
Comment: For info see http://www.gnupg.org
iD8DBQE+nedk4Qwkn7f6rL4RApbPAJ45IsojxVDjgCfNgqqFZ3PME7mGqgCfeZMV
7HMZ5frtC17uAf1rWLF1g7E=
=eTZi
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
--DKU6Jbt7q3WqK7+M--