outlook does not send emails

pcrene · Post by **pcrene** » 22 Aug 2008, 07:39

Hello All,

I configured my router (as test) as DMZ so all external stuff goes to the bubba.

I configured Outlook Express to get the emails using IMAP. Internally it works fine (@HOME) but fetching emails from another location does not work.
What can i do, is it a config item of postfix?

Cheeseboy · Post by **Cheeseboy** » 22 Aug 2008, 18:30

Hello pcrene,

Most companies, schools, and ISP's block email-related ports. I have not used an ISP yet that didn't have port 25 and 143 blocked.

Try changing the IMAP and SMTP port numbers (if possible on the email-client), or try to tunnel the IMAP and SMTP protocols through ssh. Check out this thread:
http://forum.excito.net/viewtopic.php?t=855

Cheers,

Cheeseboy

pcrene · Post by **pcrene** » 23 Aug 2008, 02:59

Hello

- with my Windows2003 the ports are OK working with the mailserver in receiving and sending emails was no problem
- from the local network its no problem in receiving and sending

the problem occurs only if i access the bubba from an external IP

so it should be a bubba configuration issue..

Rene

Eek · Post by **Eek** » 23 Aug 2008, 11:10

Hi

Cheeseboy is probably right.
If you configured your router to pass port 25 through
and you tested that with for example telnet.
When it does not succeed when trying for example from your company,
that that ISP is blocking port 25.
So either configure postfix to use another port
or use putty to tunnel to port 25.

You can use the link Cheeseboy provided

cheers
Eek

pcrene · Post by **pcrene** » 25 Aug 2008, 03:14

If you read my text carefully you would have Read that: if i replace my bubba with my Win2003 Server it all works.. so NO port 25 problem..

The problem lies within the bubba..

Rene

Eek · Post by **Eek** » 25 Aug 2008, 11:44

Hi

thanks for clearing that up, that is not how i read it.

so
router forward 25 to bubba: mail on local network works but not from an external IP
router forward 25 to Win2003: mail on local network works and from an external IP
right?

cheers
Eek

ian · Post by **ian** » 25 Aug 2008, 18:07

That's not how I read it either; no matter how "carefully" you read the original posting, the word "replace" does not appear anywhere...

Cheeseboy · Post by **Cheeseboy** » 26 Aug 2008, 20:31

Hi,

I did not read it like that either.

Ok, first try to telnet to it like Eek said. From Windoze on the foreign network you are trying to read your email from, open a command prompt (If vista see this http://www.tech-recipes.com/rx/1793/vis ... net_client):

Code: Select all

telnet xx.xyz.xx.xx

Should probably fail as everyone blocks port 23, and bubba doesn't have a telnet daemon by default:

Code: Select all

Connecting To xx.xyz.xx.xx...Could not open connection to the host, on port 23:
Connect failed

So type in:

Code: Select all

telnet xx.xyz.xx.xx 25

Note the space between the IP address and the port number.
Now, if you do have contact to your postfix server you should see something like this:

Code: Select all

220 bubba.xxxxxx.se ESMTP Postfix (Debian/GNU)

You cannot do anything with this, but you have just proved that you can connect to your IP at port 25. Then problems might be in client and/or server configurations if it doesn't work.
If you do get through and still have problems, I would recommend that you look at the bubba log files. They are in /var/log.

If you do not get this prompt, then it is a network issue. The packages on port 25 are not getting through. This could be your ISP, your employer, or whatever. Most of them will block port 25 by default, so I'm surprised you got it working in the first place on your Windows 2003 server...

Good luck, I also recommend that you check the attitude.

Best regards,

Cheeseboy

EDIT:
And of course the port number will be different depending on what protocol you use...

pcrene · Post by **pcrene** » 27 Aug 2008, 07:39

Sorry for the confusion, english is not my native language..

Ill will experiment some more this weekend...but it is difficult to test at-home using the external ip-adres.

ill keep you informed......

Rene

pcrene · Post by **pcrene** » 28 Aug 2008, 11:17

Hello ..

The telnet session did what it should do.. receiving is no problem, when sending the email i got this from Outlook Expres:

The message could not be sent because one of the recipients was rejected by the server. The rejected e-mail address was 'renerutten@hotmail.com'. Subject 'Fw: gezichtsbedrog', Account: 'mail.rrutten.nl', Server: 'mail.rrutten.nl', Protocol: SMTP, Server Response: '554 <renerutten@hotmail.com>: Relay access denied', Port: 25, Secure(SSL): No, Server Error: 554, Error Number: 0x800CCC79

Rene

pcrene · Post by **pcrene** » 28 Aug 2008, 11:21

new info...

sending from a remote IP to a registered user on the bubba works sending to an unknow user (renerutten@hotmail.com) does not work

the bubba should work as a smtp server too

Post by **DanielM** » 28 Aug 2008, 12:54

pcrene wrote:the bubba should work as a smtp server too

No it shouldn't. If the Bubba acted as smtp server relaying mails from external ip addresses to unknown users it would be an open mail relay (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_mail_relay), letting anyone send loads of spam through it, which probably would get your address on every known blacklist effectively stopping you from sending mail at all.

If you want to be able to send mail using Bubba as smtp server whereever you are you'd want to configure it for smtp authentication. I personally don't know how do do that, but I'm sure somebody else here does

/Daniel

Cheeseboy · Post by **Cheeseboy** » 28 Aug 2008, 16:13

Yes, this is correct.

You will have to configure what IP addresses it will accept outgoing email from, and if you let everone in, you will be in trouble very quickly.
The idea is to configure it to only accept outgoing emails from your local network, but that wouldn't help you if you want to send emails from the road (unless you use the web interface, or a SSH tunnel to your private network, see above).

I went for the option of a 3rd party solution and configure my mail clients to use a service provided by dyndns.com (I think they call it mailhop) for outgoing emails. I have to pay them a yearly fee, but it is well worth it. I'm sure there are free alternatives out there as well...

Even if I did configure Bubba's smtp server to accept emails from any client, my ISP would block the outgoing emails in order to prevent unwanted spam from users with badly configured mail servers...

Best regards,

Cheeseboy

pcrene · Post by **pcrene** » 29 Aug 2008, 14:47

Thanks already for all the info...

That an open relay is trouble.. i know that..
so two questions:
1) with Kerio on my windows-server users had to give also user-id and password for outgoing email.. is this possible with bubba?

2) al external persons ae within a limited ip-range (one-provider). Where kan i add ip-ranges to enable outlook to send.

There are two reasons why i want de 40 users to use Outlook:
a) outlook (IMAP) is also a backup copy
b) the web interface is very limited..would love to see a Kerio look-a-like

Rene

Cheeseboy · Post by **Cheeseboy** » 29 Aug 2008, 16:27

Hello,

I do not know how to configure postfix for authentication, and/or encryption, but you can specify IP ranges in your /etc/postfix/main.cf file.
The setting you are after is called mynetworks.

You can google for it for examples (postfix mynetworks), or perhaps easier have a look at this example file with many useful comments:
/usr/share/postfix/main.cf.dist

It might even give you ideas on how to solve the first question...

Best regards,

Cheeseboy