Sendmail messages being deferred (8.9.3)

[Jim Mallett]

The fun always happens when I'm out of the office, this week it's sendmail. I'm convinced it's an issue with our exchange server but thought I'd throw it out here for ideas.

I have 3 machines that have been successfully relaying mail to the outside world for over a year. No system changes had been made since the last reboot. Beginning Sunday I get this when trying to run:
# sendmail -v jmallett@deltamass.com
Test message
jmallett@deltamass.com... Connecting to dqvgdp01.dentaquest.com. via relay...
jmallett@deltamass.com... Deferred: Connection reset by dqvgdp01.dentaquest.com.
Closing connection to dqvgdp01.dentaquest.com.

This is what shows up in the mail log:
Oct 21 14:12:55 ddfin01 sendmail[26686]: NAA24963: to=jmallett@deltamass.com, ct
laddr=root (0/3), delay=00:22:45, xdelay=00:00:00, mailer=relay, relay=dqvgdp01,
stat=Deferred: Connection reset by dqvgdp01

I've also tried going right to port 25:
# telnet dqvgdp01 25
Trying...
Connected to dqvgdp01.
Escape character is '^]'.
Connection closed by foreign host.

The connection is closed automatically after being connected for about 2 seconds.

No changes have been made to any system files, but I've especially looked over the DS (smarthost relay), hosts, resolv.conf, and nsswitch.conf.

This all points towards a problem with our Exchange server accepting relays, but I've seen the entries and I am granted relay permissions. I have other HP boxes that are still mailing out just fine. The only thing these 3 have in common is they are 11i.

Any ideas? Should I just drop this on our Networking guys and go back to enjoying my time off?

Thanks all....
Jim

[Steven E. Protter]

Jim,

I got this same message, because the mail relay servers were patched and disallowed mail relay from my HP server.

I also once got it on a sandbox because I changed the primary IP address.

mailq shows the mail.

what happens with sendmail -q

Thats supposed to force the mail queue out.

I would say based on whats going on a microsoft patch shut down mail relay on the Exchange server.

SEP

[Jim Mallett]

Steve,

Thanks for the reply. I initially assumed the same as it isn't the first time mail relaying has stopped working courtesy of our Networking Dept. I do have a handful of other servers that are successful in relaying thru that same server. I'm like 99.9% sure it's on the M$ side. The 3 servers that stopped sending mail are capable of sending mail thru other relays if I change the DS entry.

I just thought it was weird that the only my 11.11 machines were affected, I'm thinking that's just coincidence now. When the coast is clear I'm going to poke around the relay server and see if I can't find a log file or two showing why the connection is being refused.

Thanks... Jim

[Berlene Herren]

Hello Jim,
You may want to run sendmail in a debug mode with -d8.99

#sendmail -v -d8.99 jmallett@deltamass.com

to see if it is the MX record.

I am looking at the delay timer;

delay=00:22:45

Check your nameserver(s) in /etc/resolv.conf and make sure it (they) are still functional.

Berlene