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Posted to server-user@james.apache.org by Jay Kraly <ja...@perspectivesoftware.com> on 2003/06/16 18:51:55 UTC
Random DNS and/or network issues
I haven't been watching this group lately, so this may be a topic that
has been covered already and/or fixed. The issue is that my James mail
server has been randomly deciding that certain email addresses don't
work. It will give messages like it can't find the server, unknown host
exceptions, couldn't contact server, etc... It doesn't seem like they
are all related solely to DNS, rather finding the ip-address and then
using that ip-address to contact the other server.
The weird part is that it will work fine for a couple days, sometimes
weeks, and then suddenly decide that a certain set of addresses don't
work. When I try pinging and telnetting to port 25 directly to the
destination mail servers from my mail server everything works fine.
Has this been fixed? Do other people see these same types of issues?
I'm using James 2.1.2, on a RedHat 8.0 box, jdk version 1.4.1.
Thanks
-J
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RE: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by "Noel J. Bergman" <no...@devtech.com>.
> One more thing, I just noticed that in one of my previous mailings to
> the james-user list I included some debug output which showed the
> outgoing smtp helloName as the correct full name instead of localhost.
I "fixed" it recently. We want the SMTP server to register the name that it
gets, but it hasn't done that at the time when the RemoteDelivery threads
are starting. And there is no guarantee (contract) that the SMTP server
will EVER do so, so run() has a well-marked hack that allows a certain a
period of time for the SMTP server to initialize. That period was too
short. If it doesn't find the registered name, it uses one of the server
names. Since that uses a hash, order is not guaranteed.
--- Noel
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Re: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by Jay Kraly <ja...@perspectivesoftware.com>.
One more thing, I just noticed that in one of my previous mailings to
the james-user list I included some debug output which showed the
outgoing smtp helloName as the correct full name instead of localhost.
Is there any randomness to the order of servernames such that James
restarts cause it to occasionally use different helloNames?
-J
Jay Kraly wrote:
> I've figured out my 554 problem sending to hotmail, it turns out my
> server was using 'localhost' as the outgoing smtp helloName. I did
> specify the correct servername in the servernames block, but hadn't
> set autodetect=false or autodetectip=false so it always used the first
> name it found which was 'localhost' (second was 127.0.0.1 which also
> didn't work). Reading the comments in the config.xml file I thought
> just adding a servername would override the autodetection, but I guess
> it is also necessary to turn off autodetection completely.
>
> -J
>
> Jay Kraly wrote:
>
>> Thanks for the answers. If the 554 is not James fault but due to a
>> transient issue on hotmail causing it to reject the mail, is there a
>> way to tell James to resend those emails at a later time? I've
>> noticed that it immediately bounces the 554's to hotmail back to me,
>> but on other unknownhostexceptions it keeps trying until my preset
>> limit of retries.
>>
>> I've recompiled 2.1.2 with "mail.debug" set to true to see if it will
>> give me any further hint as to what is going wrong. If any of the
>> output looks useful I'll send it on to you to see if you can make any
>> sense of it.
>>
>> Thanks again for the help.
>>
>> -J
>>
>> Noel J. Bergman wrote:
>>
>>>> The fact is that my clients who are using the James mail server are
>>>> getting fed up with my explanation that it is hotmail's fault and/or
>>>> transient network issues.
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I send e-mails to Hotmail constantly without problems. I scanned
>>> our james
>>> logs, and we have never had this particular problem with Hotmail.
>>> None of
>>> the examples I posted earlier were related to James. They had the same
>>> problem with sendmail, exim, postfix, qmail, etc. Don't take my
>>> word for
>>> it: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=554+hotmail
>>>
>>> The 554 is a deliberate rejection of the SMTP transaction from
>>> Hotmail, not
>>> something coming from James. That rejection is not based upon the
>>> James
>>> code, but upon either the IP address, a problem with Hotmail, or the
>>> content
>>> of the transaction. For example, a 554 is often used to reject
>>> spam. It
>>> would be nice if Hotmail gave you more information related to the 554.
>>>
>>> Are you aware that your mail server is in at least one spam-blocking
>>> DNS
>>> RBL? It isn't your fault. You are just collateral damage in a /24
>>> netblock.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> the lack of stability when connecting to the outside world is
>>>> forcing me to consider switching to another platform.
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Your experiences are more than atypical, and it is not clear if the
>>> instability originates from within James or within the network.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> I'm not trying to be a pain, just trying to ascertain whether James is
>>>> moving in a direction that will solve my problem, or not.
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> There is new DNS code in James v2.2.0aX, and there is always work to
>>> improve
>>> stability and reliability. There is nothing that James can do about
>>> that
>>> 554, but if there is something that we can do about the IP issue,
>>> we'd do
>>> it. If you can provide examples from your log, that could be helpful.
>>>
>>> --- Noel
>>>
>>>
>>> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
>>> To unsubscribe, e-mail: james-user-unsubscribe@jakarta.apache.org
>>> For additional commands, e-mail: james-user-help@jakarta.apache.org
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>
>
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Re: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by Serge Knystautas <se...@lokitech.com>.
Noel J. Bergman wrote:
>>I've figured out my 554 problem sending to hotmail, it turns out my
>>server was using 'localhost' as the outgoing smtp helloName.
>
>
> Oh that's interesting! Sounds like a good FAQ item. :-)
>
> RemoteDelivery uses (or tries to use) the server name defined for the SMTP
> service. This has nothing to do with the autodetection/autodetectip
> support.
>
> Good job tracking that problem down! :-)
Added to Wiki.
--
Serge Knystautas
President
Lokitech >> software . strategy . design >> http://www.lokitech.com
p. 301.656.5501
e. sergek@lokitech.com
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RE: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by "Noel J. Bergman" <no...@devtech.com>.
> I've figured out my 554 problem sending to hotmail, it turns out my
> server was using 'localhost' as the outgoing smtp helloName.
Oh that's interesting! Sounds like a good FAQ item. :-)
RemoteDelivery uses (or tries to use) the server name defined for the SMTP
service. This has nothing to do with the autodetection/autodetectip
support.
Good job tracking that problem down! :-)
--- Noel
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Re: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by Jay Kraly <ja...@perspectivesoftware.com>.
I've figured out my 554 problem sending to hotmail, it turns out my
server was using 'localhost' as the outgoing smtp helloName. I did
specify the correct servername in the servernames block, but hadn't set
autodetect=false or autodetectip=false so it always used the first name
it found which was 'localhost' (second was 127.0.0.1 which also didn't
work). Reading the comments in the config.xml file I thought just
adding a servername would override the autodetection, but I guess it is
also necessary to turn off autodetection completely.
-J
Jay Kraly wrote:
> Thanks for the answers. If the 554 is not James fault but due to a
> transient issue on hotmail causing it to reject the mail, is there a
> way to tell James to resend those emails at a later time? I've
> noticed that it immediately bounces the 554's to hotmail back to me,
> but on other unknownhostexceptions it keeps trying until my preset
> limit of retries.
>
> I've recompiled 2.1.2 with "mail.debug" set to true to see if it will
> give me any further hint as to what is going wrong. If any of the
> output looks useful I'll send it on to you to see if you can make any
> sense of it.
>
> Thanks again for the help.
>
> -J
>
> Noel J. Bergman wrote:
>
>>>The fact is that my clients who are using the James mail server are
>>>getting fed up with my explanation that it is hotmail's fault and/or
>>>transient network issues.
>>>
>>>
>>
>>I send e-mails to Hotmail constantly without problems. I scanned our james
>>logs, and we have never had this particular problem with Hotmail. None of
>>the examples I posted earlier were related to James. They had the same
>>problem with sendmail, exim, postfix, qmail, etc. Don't take my word for
>>it: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=554+hotmail
>>
>>The 554 is a deliberate rejection of the SMTP transaction from Hotmail, not
>>something coming from James. That rejection is not based upon the James
>>code, but upon either the IP address, a problem with Hotmail, or the content
>>of the transaction. For example, a 554 is often used to reject spam. It
>>would be nice if Hotmail gave you more information related to the 554.
>>
>>Are you aware that your mail server is in at least one spam-blocking DNS
>>RBL? It isn't your fault. You are just collateral damage in a /24
>>netblock.
>>
>>
>>
>>>the lack of stability when connecting to the outside world is
>>>forcing me to consider switching to another platform.
>>>
>>>
>>
>>Your experiences are more than atypical, and it is not clear if the
>>instability originates from within James or within the network.
>>
>>
>>
>>>I'm not trying to be a pain, just trying to ascertain whether James is
>>>moving in a direction that will solve my problem, or not.
>>>
>>>
>>
>>There is new DNS code in James v2.2.0aX, and there is always work to improve
>>stability and reliability. There is nothing that James can do about that
>>554, but if there is something that we can do about the IP issue, we'd do
>>it. If you can provide examples from your log, that could be helpful.
>>
>> --- Noel
>>
>>
>>---------------------------------------------------------------------
>>To unsubscribe, e-mail: james-user-unsubscribe@jakarta.apache.org
>>For additional commands, e-mail: james-user-help@jakarta.apache.org
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
RE: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by "Noel J. Bergman" <no...@devtech.com>.
> Setting the 'networkaddress.cache.negative.ttl' to 0 seems to have
> helped.
Good. If you can reproduce a consistent issue, please let Sun know.
Personally it sounds as if your DNS server has some issues, if you are
getting such inconsistent replies.
> Is it James or JavaMail that chooses between multiple MX records if they
> exist?
James. But JavaMail is the one looking up the server address, and throwing
the UHE.
> I'm thinking if one server was down, maybe its not even trying
> the other servers because it caches the fact that the original
> name did not work.
If there are multiple servers, James will try them each in sequence. There
were some recent changes to improve that behavior.
> So as long as one server is down and its caching negative lookups,
> even for 10 seconds, it isn't able to connect to a good server
> because it doesn't try the next one.
If there are multiple MX records, you should see James try the next one
immediately. I have seen that often enough with Hotmail, Yahoo!, AOL, etc.
--- Noel
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Re: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by Jay Kraly <ja...@perspectivesoftware.com>.
It is definetly using /usr/local/java, so I'm positive its 1.4.1.
Setting the 'networkaddress.cache.negative.ttl' to 0 seems to have
helped. I just watched James get the unknownhostexception from one MX
server, then try a different server 10 minutes later, fail a couple more
times, and then finally succeed in sending the message. For what its
worth, 'networkaddress.cache.negative.ttl' is set to 10 by default in
1.4.1, so some negative caching of dns entries always does occur.
Is it James or JavaMail that chooses between multiple MX records if they
exist? I'm thinking if one server was down, maybe its not even trying
the other servers because it caches the fact that the original name did
not work. So as long as one server is down and its caching negative
lookups, even for 10 seconds, it isn't able to connect to a good server
because it doesn't try the next one. Just a thought.
Thanks for the help debugging.
-J
Noel J. Bergman wrote:
>Jay,
>
>When you run phoenix.sh, it will echo JAVA_HOME, e.g.,
>
> Using JAVA_HOME: /usr/local/java
>
>so you'll know definitely under which one Phoenix thinks it is running.
>
>Let me know how it goes.
>
> --- Noel
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: Jay Kraly [mailto:jay@perspectivesoftware.com]
>Sent: Tuesday, June 17, 2003 16:21
>To: James Users List
>Subject: Re: Random DNS and/or network issues
>
>
>I also found some other people with similar problems on the java.sun.com
>forum, I'm going to try the negative.ttl fix to see if it makes any
>difference. Unless I'm insane I'm using 1.4.1:
>
>[root@mailhost local]# $JAVA_HOME/bin/java -version
>java version "1.4.1_02"
>Java(TM) 2 Runtime Environment, Standard Edition (build 1.4.1_02-b06)
>Java HotSpot(TM) Client VM (build 1.4.1_02-b06, mixed mode)
>
>I do have 1.3.1 installed on the same machine, but I've set JAVA_HOME to
>the 1.4.1_02 version.
>
>Thanks for the info.
>
>-J
>
>Noel J. Bergman wrote:
>
>
>
>>>Maybe the 1.4.1 JVM has an issue recovering once it thinks a host is down.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>I don't mean to be cute, but are you sure that you are running on JVM 1.4.1
>>on that system? The defect you are describing is in the release notes for
>>JVM 1.4.1: "Prior to J2SE 1.4 if InetAddress.getByName if a lookup to the
>>name service failed then all subsequent lookups of that hostname would fail
>>for the lifetime of the virtual machine."
>>
>>More details at http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.1/networking-relnotes.html.
>>See also the javadocs:
>>http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.1/docs/api/java/net/InetAddress.html (section
>>on InetAddress Caching) and
>>http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4/jcp/j2se-1_4-mr_docs-spec/net.html (the bottom
>>of the page). You could also try 1.4.2, although I don't see anything in
>>the release notes
>>(http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.2/docs/guide/net/relnotes.html) that suggests
>>a later fix.
>>
>>You could try setting networkaddress.cache.negative.ttl to 0, and see if
>>that helps in your situation.
>>
>> --- Noel
>>
>>
>
>
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>
>
>
>
RE: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by "Noel J. Bergman" <no...@devtech.com>.
Jay,
When you run phoenix.sh, it will echo JAVA_HOME, e.g.,
Using JAVA_HOME: /usr/local/java
so you'll know definitely under which one Phoenix thinks it is running.
Let me know how it goes.
--- Noel
-----Original Message-----
From: Jay Kraly [mailto:jay@perspectivesoftware.com]
Sent: Tuesday, June 17, 2003 16:21
To: James Users List
Subject: Re: Random DNS and/or network issues
I also found some other people with similar problems on the java.sun.com
forum, I'm going to try the negative.ttl fix to see if it makes any
difference. Unless I'm insane I'm using 1.4.1:
[root@mailhost local]# $JAVA_HOME/bin/java -version
java version "1.4.1_02"
Java(TM) 2 Runtime Environment, Standard Edition (build 1.4.1_02-b06)
Java HotSpot(TM) Client VM (build 1.4.1_02-b06, mixed mode)
I do have 1.3.1 installed on the same machine, but I've set JAVA_HOME to
the 1.4.1_02 version.
Thanks for the info.
-J
Noel J. Bergman wrote:
>>Maybe the 1.4.1 JVM has an issue recovering once it thinks a host is down.
>>
>>
>
>I don't mean to be cute, but are you sure that you are running on JVM 1.4.1
>on that system? The defect you are describing is in the release notes for
>JVM 1.4.1: "Prior to J2SE 1.4 if InetAddress.getByName if a lookup to the
>name service failed then all subsequent lookups of that hostname would fail
>for the lifetime of the virtual machine."
>
>More details at http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.1/networking-relnotes.html.
>See also the javadocs:
>http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.1/docs/api/java/net/InetAddress.html (section
>on InetAddress Caching) and
>http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4/jcp/j2se-1_4-mr_docs-spec/net.html (the bottom
>of the page). You could also try 1.4.2, although I don't see anything in
>the release notes
>(http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.2/docs/guide/net/relnotes.html) that suggests
>a later fix.
>
>You could try setting networkaddress.cache.negative.ttl to 0, and see if
>that helps in your situation.
>
> --- Noel
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Re: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by Jay Kraly <ja...@perspectivesoftware.com>.
I also found some other people with similar problems on the java.sun.com
forum, I'm going to try the negative.ttl fix to see if it makes any
difference. Unless I'm insane I'm using 1.4.1:
[root@mailhost local]# $JAVA_HOME/bin/java -version
java version "1.4.1_02"
Java(TM) 2 Runtime Environment, Standard Edition (build 1.4.1_02-b06)
Java HotSpot(TM) Client VM (build 1.4.1_02-b06, mixed mode)
I do have 1.3.1 installed on the same machine, but I've set JAVA_HOME to
the 1.4.1_02 version.
Thanks for the info.
-J
Noel J. Bergman wrote:
>>Maybe the 1.4.1 JVM has an issue recovering once it thinks a host is down.
>>
>>
>
>I don't mean to be cute, but are you sure that you are running on JVM 1.4.1
>on that system? The defect you are describing is in the release notes for
>JVM 1.4.1: "Prior to J2SE 1.4 if InetAddress.getByName if a lookup to the
>name service failed then all subsequent lookups of that hostname would fail
>for the lifetime of the virtual machine."
>
>More details at http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.1/networking-relnotes.html.
>See also the javadocs:
>http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.1/docs/api/java/net/InetAddress.html (section
>on InetAddress Caching) and
>http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4/jcp/j2se-1_4-mr_docs-spec/net.html (the bottom
>of the page). You could also try 1.4.2, although I don't see anything in
>the release notes
>(http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.2/docs/guide/net/relnotes.html) that suggests
>a later fix.
>
>You could try setting networkaddress.cache.negative.ttl to 0, and see if
>that helps in your situation.
>
> --- Noel
>
>
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>
>
>
>
RE: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by "Noel J. Bergman" <no...@devtech.com>.
> Maybe the 1.4.1 JVM has an issue recovering once it thinks a host is down.
I don't mean to be cute, but are you sure that you are running on JVM 1.4.1
on that system? The defect you are describing is in the release notes for
JVM 1.4.1: "Prior to J2SE 1.4 if InetAddress.getByName if a lookup to the
name service failed then all subsequent lookups of that hostname would fail
for the lifetime of the virtual machine."
More details at http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.1/networking-relnotes.html.
See also the javadocs:
http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.1/docs/api/java/net/InetAddress.html (section
on InetAddress Caching) and
http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4/jcp/j2se-1_4-mr_docs-spec/net.html (the bottom
of the page). You could also try 1.4.2, although I don't see anything in
the release notes
(http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.2/docs/guide/net/relnotes.html) that suggests
a later fix.
You could try setting networkaddress.cache.negative.ttl to 0, and see if
that helps in your situation.
--- Noel
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Re: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by Jay Kraly <ja...@perspectivesoftware.com>.
I have my retry set to 10 minutes with a max retries of 10, which
admittedly is probably pretty short. However, I've seen it retry after
I've manually tested the network and it will fail until it reaches the
max of 10 retries then bounce the message to the user. It never seems
to recover once it has had an issue.
Maybe the 1.4.1 JVM has an issue recovering once it thinks a host is down.
-J
Noel J. Bergman wrote:
>>The first bit is the exception when James tries to send to the server,
>>then I ping and telnet to port 25, stop and restart James, and at the
>>end you can see that James is able to send to the aauwms2 server with no
>>problems after being restarted.
>>
>>
>
>
>
>>RemoteDelivery: Temporary exception delivering mail (Mailxxx-to-aauw.org:
>>javax.mail.MessagingException: Unknown SMTP host: aauwms2.aauw.org.;
>>nested exception is:
>> java.net.UnknownHostException: aauwms2.aauw.org.
>> at ...SMTPTransport.openServer(SMTPTransport.java:909)
>>
>>
>
>That appears to be a transient network issue. JavaMail tries to open a
>socket to the host, gets a UHE from the JVM, and rethrows it wrapped in a
>MessagingException. When you go to test, the network issue has already
>cleared. I suspect that James would send the message when it retried. You
>might want to shorten delayTime (RFC 2821 requests at least 30 mins, James
>defaults to 6 hours) and increase maxRetries (RFC 2821 suggests at least
>4 - 5 days, James defaults to 30 hours).
>
> --- Noel
>
>
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>
>
>
RE: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by "Noel J. Bergman" <no...@devtech.com>.
> The first bit is the exception when James tries to send to the server,
> then I ping and telnet to port 25, stop and restart James, and at the
> end you can see that James is able to send to the aauwms2 server with no
> problems after being restarted.
> RemoteDelivery: Temporary exception delivering mail (Mailxxx-to-aauw.org:
> javax.mail.MessagingException: Unknown SMTP host: aauwms2.aauw.org.;
> nested exception is:
> java.net.UnknownHostException: aauwms2.aauw.org.
> at ...SMTPTransport.openServer(SMTPTransport.java:909)
That appears to be a transient network issue. JavaMail tries to open a
socket to the host, gets a UHE from the JVM, and rethrows it wrapped in a
MessagingException. When you go to test, the network issue has already
cleared. I suspect that James would send the message when it retried. You
might want to shorten delayTime (RFC 2821 requests at least 30 mins, James
defaults to 6 hours) and increase maxRetries (RFC 2821 suggests at least
4 - 5 days, James defaults to 30 hours).
--- Noel
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Re: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by Jay Kraly <ja...@perspectivesoftware.com>.
Here is some output from my James server that will hopefully be helpful.
The first bit is the exception when James tries to send to the server,
then I ping and telnet to port 25, stop and restart James, and at the
end you can see that James is able to send to the aauwms2 server with no
problems after being restarted. I've removed email addresses from the
logs, but I left in the server names even though I don't believe it has
anything to do with the specific servers. By tomorrow morning James
will not be able to send to a different server and will probably still
be sending to aauwms2 with no problems.
Thanks for any help you can give me to resolve this problem, I'd rather
not have to restart James every night.
(Not to side track things, but I just noticed that this server is
running exchange. Maybe I'll check back through the logs to see if that
is common to all the unknown SMTP host problems I've been having.)
-J
17/06/03 12:10:22 INFO James.Mailet: RemoteDelivery: Temporary
exception delivering mail (Mail1055860215161-81-to-aauw.org:
javax.mail.MessagingException: Unknown SMTP host: aauwms2.aauw.org.;
nested exception is:
java.net.UnknownHostException: aauwms2.aauw.org.
at
com.sun.mail.smtp.SMTPTransport.openServer(SMTPTransport.java:909)
at
com.sun.mail.smtp.SMTPTransport.protocolConnect(SMTPTransport.java:158)
at javax.mail.Service.connect(Service.java:233)
at javax.mail.Service.connect(Service.java:134)
at javax.mail.Service.connect(Service.java:86)
at com.sun.mail.smtp.SMTPTransport.connect(SMTPTransport.java:95)
at
org.apache.james.transport.mailets.RemoteDelivery.deliver(RemoteDelivery.java:242)
at
org.apache.james.transport.mailets.RemoteDelivery.run(RemoteDelivery.java:685)
at java.lang.Thread.run(Thread.java:536
[root@mailhost logs]# ping aauwms2.aauw.org
PING aauwms2.aauw.org (206.155.168.206) from 65.105.59.149 : 56(84)
bytes of data.
64 bytes from aauwms2.aauw.org (206.155.168.206): icmp_seq=1 ttl=118
time=29.8 ms
64 bytes from aauwms2.aauw.org (206.155.168.206): icmp_seq=2 ttl=118
time=13.2 ms
[root@mailhost SAR-INF]# telnet aauwms2.aauw.org 25
Trying 206.155.168.206...
Connected to aauwms2.aauw.org.
Escape character is '^]'.
220 AAUWMS2.aauw.org ESMTP Server (Microsoft Exchange Internet Mail
Service 5.5.2656.59) ready
helo mailhost.perspectivesoftware.com
250 OK
mail from:<po...@mailhost.perspectivesoftware.com>
250 OK - mail from <po...@mailhost.perspectivesoftware.com>
^]
telnet> quit
Connection closed.
[root@mailhost SAR-INF]# /etc/rc.d/init.d/james stop
[root@mailhost SAR-INF]# /etc/rc.d/init.d/james start
...
...
DEBUG SMTP: useEhlo false, useAuth false
DEBUG: SMTPTransport trying to connect to host "aauwms2.aauw.org.", port 25
DEBUG SMTP RCVD: 220 AAUWMS2.aauw.org ESMTP Server (Microsoft Exchange
Internet Mail Service 5.5.2656.59) ready
DEBUG: SMTPTransport connected to host "aauwms2.aauw.org.", port: 25
DEBUG SMTP SENT: HELO mailhost.perspectivesoftware.com
DEBUG SMTP RCVD: 250 OK
DEBUG SMTP: use8bit false
DEBUG SMTP SENT: MAIL FROM:<po...@mailhost.perspectivesoftware.com>
DEBUG SMTP RCVD: 250 OK - mail from
<po...@mailhost.perspectivesoftware.com>
DEBUG SMTP SENT: RCPT TO:<xx...@aauw.org>
DEBUG SMTP RCVD: 250 OK - Recipient <xx...@AAUW.ORG>
DEBUG SMTP SENT: RCPT TO:<xx...@aauw.org>
DEBUG SMTP RCVD: 250 OK - Recipient <xx...@AAUW.ORG>
DEBUG SMTP SENT: RCPT TO:<xx...@aauw.org>
DEBUG SMTP RCVD: 250 OK - Recipient <xx...@AAUW.ORG>
DEBUG SMTP SENT: RCPT TO:<xx...@aauw.org>
DEBUG SMTP RCVD: 250 OK - Recipient <xx...@AAUW.ORG>
DEBUG SMTP SENT: RCPT TO:<xx...@aauw.org>
DEBUG SMTP RCVD: 250 OK - Recipient <xx...@AAUW.ORG>
Verified Addresses
xxx@aauw.org
xxx@aauw.org
xxx@aauw.org
xxx@aauw.org
xxx@aauw.org
DEBUG SMTP SENT: DATA
DEBUG SMTP RCVD: 354 Send data. End with CRLF.CRLF
DEBUG SMTP SENT:
.
DEBUG SMTP RCVD: 250 OK
DEBUG SMTP SENT: QUIT
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RE: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by "Noel J. Bergman" <no...@devtech.com>.
> Thanks for the answers. If the 554 is not James fault but due to a
> transient issue on hotmail causing it to reject the mail, is there a way
> to tell James to resend those emails at a later time?
That is what people were really complaining about regarding Hotmail. Those
554 messages are permanent errors, according to the standard. Hotmail
appears to be using them as temporary, which requires the original sender to
re-try the message. It would be an RFC violation for James to retry the
message after receiving a 5xx response.
> I've noticed that it immediately bounces the 554's to hotmail back
> to me, but on other unknownhostexceptions it keeps trying until my
> preset limit of retries.
James considers a UHE to be temporary, and retries it.
> I've recompiled 2.1.2 with "mail.debug" set to true to see if it will
> give me any further hint as to what is going wrong.
You can also add <debug>true</debug> for the RemoteDelivery mailet.
--- Noel
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Re: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by Jay Kraly <ja...@perspectivesoftware.com>.
Thanks for the answers. If the 554 is not James fault but due to a
transient issue on hotmail causing it to reject the mail, is there a way
to tell James to resend those emails at a later time? I've noticed that
it immediately bounces the 554's to hotmail back to me, but on other
unknownhostexceptions it keeps trying until my preset limit of retries.
I've recompiled 2.1.2 with "mail.debug" set to true to see if it will
give me any further hint as to what is going wrong. If any of the
output looks useful I'll send it on to you to see if you can make any
sense of it.
Thanks again for the help.
-J
Noel J. Bergman wrote:
>>The fact is that my clients who are using the James mail server are
>>getting fed up with my explanation that it is hotmail's fault and/or
>>transient network issues.
>>
>>
>
>I send e-mails to Hotmail constantly without problems. I scanned our james
>logs, and we have never had this particular problem with Hotmail. None of
>the examples I posted earlier were related to James. They had the same
>problem with sendmail, exim, postfix, qmail, etc. Don't take my word for
>it: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=554+hotmail
>
>The 554 is a deliberate rejection of the SMTP transaction from Hotmail, not
>something coming from James. That rejection is not based upon the James
>code, but upon either the IP address, a problem with Hotmail, or the content
>of the transaction. For example, a 554 is often used to reject spam. It
>would be nice if Hotmail gave you more information related to the 554.
>
>Are you aware that your mail server is in at least one spam-blocking DNS
>RBL? It isn't your fault. You are just collateral damage in a /24
>netblock.
>
>
>
>>the lack of stability when connecting to the outside world is
>>forcing me to consider switching to another platform.
>>
>>
>
>Your experiences are more than atypical, and it is not clear if the
>instability originates from within James or within the network.
>
>
>
>>I'm not trying to be a pain, just trying to ascertain whether James is
>>moving in a direction that will solve my problem, or not.
>>
>>
>
>There is new DNS code in James v2.2.0aX, and there is always work to improve
>stability and reliability. There is nothing that James can do about that
>554, but if there is something that we can do about the IP issue, we'd do
>it. If you can provide examples from your log, that could be helpful.
>
> --- Noel
>
>
>---------------------------------------------------------------------
>To unsubscribe, e-mail: james-user-unsubscribe@jakarta.apache.org
>For additional commands, e-mail: james-user-help@jakarta.apache.org
>
>
>
>
RE: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by "Noel J. Bergman" <no...@devtech.com>.
> The fact is that my clients who are using the James mail server are
> getting fed up with my explanation that it is hotmail's fault and/or
> transient network issues.
I send e-mails to Hotmail constantly without problems. I scanned our james
logs, and we have never had this particular problem with Hotmail. None of
the examples I posted earlier were related to James. They had the same
problem with sendmail, exim, postfix, qmail, etc. Don't take my word for
it: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=554+hotmail
The 554 is a deliberate rejection of the SMTP transaction from Hotmail, not
something coming from James. That rejection is not based upon the James
code, but upon either the IP address, a problem with Hotmail, or the content
of the transaction. For example, a 554 is often used to reject spam. It
would be nice if Hotmail gave you more information related to the 554.
Are you aware that your mail server is in at least one spam-blocking DNS
RBL? It isn't your fault. You are just collateral damage in a /24
netblock.
> the lack of stability when connecting to the outside world is
> forcing me to consider switching to another platform.
Your experiences are more than atypical, and it is not clear if the
instability originates from within James or within the network.
> I'm not trying to be a pain, just trying to ascertain whether James is
> moving in a direction that will solve my problem, or not.
There is new DNS code in James v2.2.0aX, and there is always work to improve
stability and reliability. There is nothing that James can do about that
554, but if there is something that we can do about the IP issue, we'd do
it. If you can provide examples from your log, that could be helpful.
--- Noel
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Re: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by Jay Kraly <ja...@perspectivesoftware.com>.
The fact is that my clients who are using the James mail server are
getting fed up with my explanation that it is hotmail's fault and/or
transient network issues. They are all technically savvy enough to
realize that when they switch to other SMTP servers they can send the
same mail to the same addresses without a problem. This includes the
hotmail issue as well as my earlier email about James deciding that
certain addresses are bad. I realize this isn't your problem, but as
much as I like the James architecture, the lack of stability when
connecting to the outside world is forcing me to consider switching to
another platform.
I'm not trying to be a pain, just trying to ascertain whether James is
moving in a direction that will solve my problem, or not.
-J
Noel J. Bergman wrote:
>>Another thing I've noticed is that James always refuses to send to
>>hotmail (even after a restart), but if I try it manually via
>>telnet from the same server it works fine.
>>
>>
>
>
>
>>RemoteDelivery: Exception delivering message
>>
>>
>(Mail1055784543566-57-to-hotmail.com)
>
>
>>- 554 Transaction failed
>>
>>
>
>Actually, no. James attempted delivery, and hotmail refused the transaction
>with a "554" permanent failure. There are 100s of references to this on the
>Internet, e.g.,
>
> http://www.exim.org/pipermail/exim-users/Week-of-Mon-20010521/026347.html
>
>http://www.greatcircle.com/lists/list-managers/mhonarc/list-managers.199909/
>msg00003.html
> http://www.freelists.org/archives/freelists-users/09-2002/msg00000.html
>
>>>From what I've read, Microsoft got their software into hotmail some years
>ago, things got FUBAR, and now it is pretty much an on-going SNAFU.
>
> --- Noel
>
>
>---------------------------------------------------------------------
>To unsubscribe, e-mail: james-user-unsubscribe@jakarta.apache.org
>For additional commands, e-mail: james-user-help@jakarta.apache.org
>
>
>
>
RE: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by "Noel J. Bergman" <no...@devtech.com>.
> Another thing I've noticed is that James always refuses to send to
> hotmail (even after a restart), but if I try it manually via
> telnet from the same server it works fine.
> RemoteDelivery: Exception delivering message
(Mail1055784543566-57-to-hotmail.com)
> - 554 Transaction failed
Actually, no. James attempted delivery, and hotmail refused the transaction
with a "554" permanent failure. There are 100s of references to this on the
Internet, e.g.,
http://www.exim.org/pipermail/exim-users/Week-of-Mon-20010521/026347.html
http://www.greatcircle.com/lists/list-managers/mhonarc/list-managers.199909/
msg00003.html
http://www.freelists.org/archives/freelists-users/09-2002/msg00000.html
>From what I've read, Microsoft got their software into hotmail some years
ago, things got FUBAR, and now it is pretty much an on-going SNAFU.
--- Noel
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Re: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by Jay Kraly <ja...@perspectivesoftware.com>.
Another thing I've noticed is that James always refuses to send to
hotmail (even after a restart), but if I try it manually via telnet from
the same server it works fine. This is the exception I get when sending
to hotmail.
16/06/03 13:29:04 INFO James.Mailet: RemoteDelivery: Exception
delivering message (Mail1055784543566-57-to-hotmail.com) - 554
Transaction failed
16/06/03 13:29:04 INFO James.Mailet: RemoteDelivery: Permanent
exception delivering mail (Mail1055784543566-57-to-hotmail.com:
javax.mail.MessagingException: 554 Transaction failed
at
com.sun.mail.smtp.SMTPTransport.issueCommand(SMTPTransport.java:923)
at com.sun.mail.smtp.SMTPTransport.mailFrom(SMTPTransport.java:643)
at
com.sun.mail.smtp.SMTPTransport.sendMessage(SMTPTransport.java:322)
at
org.apache.james.transport.mailets.RemoteDelivery.deliver(RemoteDelivery.java:253)
at
org.apache.james.transport.mailets.RemoteDelivery.run(RemoteDelivery.java:685)
-J
Jay Kraly wrote:
> My suspicion is that a transient network problem causes an initial
> problem, and then for some reason it doesn't recover once the network
> or server is back online. So until I restart James it gets
> UnknownHostExceptions, but after the restart everything is fine for a
> little while.
>
> -J
>
> Noel J. Bergman wrote:
>
>>> my James mail server has been randomly deciding that certain email
>>> addresses don't work.
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>> It doesn't seem like they are all related solely to DNS, rather
>>> finding the ip-address and then using that ip-address to contact
>>> the other server.
>>>
>>
>>
>> Could it just be transient network problems? Those happen all the time.
>> One of my regular relays is to one of the FTC servers. I often see
>> one of
>> them become unavailable.
>>
>> --- Noel
>>
>>
>> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
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>>
>>
>>
>>
>
>
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RE: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by "Noel J. Bergman" <no...@devtech.com>.
> until I restart James it gets UnknownHostExceptions, but after
> the restart everything is fine for a little while.
James doesn't cache that information. If the DNS records are changing,
there could be stale data in the DNS. But the UnknownHostException would be
coming from java.net.
--- Noel
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Re: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by Jay Kraly <ja...@perspectivesoftware.com>.
My suspicion is that a transient network problem causes an initial
problem, and then for some reason it doesn't recover once the network or
server is back online. So until I restart James it gets
UnknownHostExceptions, but after the restart everything is fine for a
little while.
-J
Noel J. Bergman wrote:
>>my James mail server has been randomly deciding that certain email
>>addresses don't work.
>>
>>
>
>
>
>>It doesn't seem like they are all related solely to DNS, rather
>>finding the ip-address and then using that ip-address to contact
>>the other server.
>>
>>
>
>Could it just be transient network problems? Those happen all the time.
>One of my regular relays is to one of the FTC servers. I often see one of
>them become unavailable.
>
> --- Noel
>
>
>---------------------------------------------------------------------
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>
>
>
>
RE: Random DNS and/or network issues
Posted by "Noel J. Bergman" <no...@devtech.com>.
> my James mail server has been randomly deciding that certain email
> addresses don't work.
> It doesn't seem like they are all related solely to DNS, rather
> finding the ip-address and then using that ip-address to contact
> the other server.
Could it just be transient network problems? Those happen all the time.
One of my regular relays is to one of the FTC servers. I often see one of
them become unavailable.
--- Noel
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