sendmail to hotmail not working

[Szabolcs Torok]

Hi all

I have a problem with my RH 6.2 mail server: sendmail cannot send mail to any adress belonging to hotmail.com. Here is the error message:
Running OAA00686 (sequence 1 of 1)
sza_bee@hotmail.com... hotmail.com: Name server timeout
sza_bee@hotmail.com... Transient parse error -- message queued for future delivery

I saw that other people had the same problem, and tried the solutions the forum gave them, but none of them is working. I'm not a linux guru, but I must solve this because is getting pretty anoying that people cannot send email to hotmail accounts. Any other emails are working.

Thanx in advance for your help,
Szabi

[Ron Kinner]

Do
nslookup
set type=mx
hotmail.com.

and see what it says for hotmail.com's mail ip address. If you are getting a name server timeout then this is the first place to look.

I get 11 different addresses when I do it.

Ron

[Madhu Sudhan_1]

use dig mx hotmail.com. To see what your DNS server says about hotmail.com

-Allen.

[Szabolcs Torok]

Hi folks

thanks for the answers, here are the results for what you told me to do (nslookup set type=mx hotmail.com):
Non-authoritative answer:
hotmail.com preference = 5, mail exchanger = mx01.hotmail.com
hotmail.com preference = 5, mail exchanger = mx02.hotmail.com
hotmail.com preference = 5, mail exchanger = mx04.hotmail.com
hotmail.com preference = 5, mail exchanger = mx05.hotmail.com
hotmail.com preference = 5, mail exchanger = mx06.hotmail.com
hotmail.com preference = 5, mail exchanger = mx07.hotmail.com
hotmail.com preference = 5, mail exchanger = mx08.hotmail.com
hotmail.com preference = 5, mail exchanger = mx09.hotmail.com
hotmail.com preference = 5, mail exchanger = mx10.hotmail.com
hotmail.com preference = 5, mail exchanger = mx11.hotmail.com
hotmail.com preference = 5, mail exchanger = mx12.hotmail.com
hotmail.com preference = 5, mail exchanger = mx13.hotmail.com
hotmail.com preference = 5, mail exchanger = mx14.hotmail.com
hotmail.com preference = 5, mail exchanger = mx15.hotmail.com

Authoritative answers can be found from:
mx01.hotmail.com internet address = 64.4.55.71
mx02.hotmail.com internet address = 64.4.55.135
mx04.hotmail.com internet address = 64.4.56.135
mx05.hotmail.com internet address = 64.4.56.199
mx06.hotmail.com internet address = 64.4.55.7
mx07.hotmail.com internet address = 64.4.42.7
mx08.hotmail.com internet address = 64.4.49.7
mx09.hotmail.com internet address = 64.4.49.71
mx10.hotmail.com internet address = 64.4.49.135
mx11.hotmail.com internet address = 64.4.49.199
mx12.hotmail.com internet address = 64.4.50.7

and the other (dig mx hotmail.com)

; <<>> DiG 8.2 <<>> mx hotmail.com
;; res options: init recurs defnam dnsrch
;; got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 4
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 14, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 11
;; QUERY SECTION:
;; hotmail.com, type = MX, class = IN

;; ANSWER SECTION:
hotmail.com. 58m37s IN MX 5 mx01.hotmail.com.
hotmail.com. 58m37s IN MX 5 mx02.hotmail.com.
hotmail.com. 58m37s IN MX 5 mx04.hotmail.com.
hotmail.com. 58m37s IN MX 5 mx05.hotmail.com.
hotmail.com. 58m37s IN MX 5 mx06.hotmail.com.
hotmail.com. 58m37s IN MX 5 mx07.hotmail.com.
hotmail.com. 58m37s IN MX 5 mx08.hotmail.com.
hotmail.com. 58m37s IN MX 5 mx09.hotmail.com.
hotmail.com. 58m37s IN MX 5 mx10.hotmail.com.
hotmail.com. 58m37s IN MX 5 mx11.hotmail.com.
hotmail.com. 58m37s IN MX 5 mx12.hotmail.com.
hotmail.com. 58m37s IN MX 5 mx13.hotmail.com.
hotmail.com. 58m37s IN MX 5 mx14.hotmail.com.
hotmail.com. 58m37s IN MX 5 mx15.hotmail.com.

;; ADDITIONAL SECTION:
mx01.hotmail.com. 58m37s IN A 64.4.55.71
mx02.hotmail.com. 58m37s IN A 64.4.55.135
mx04.hotmail.com. 58m37s IN A 64.4.56.135
mx05.hotmail.com. 58m37s IN A 64.4.56.199
mx06.hotmail.com. 58m37s IN A 64.4.55.7
mx07.hotmail.com. 52S IN A 64.4.42.7
mx08.hotmail.com. 58m37s IN A 64.4.49.7
mx09.hotmail.com. 58m37s IN A 64.4.49.71
mx10.hotmail.com. 58m37s IN A 64.4.49.135
mx11.hotmail.com. 58m37s IN A 64.4.49.199
mx12.hotmail.com. 58m37s IN A 64.4.50.7
;; Total query time: 76 msec

It seems to me that everything is OK, isn't it? Where should I investigate further?

Szabi

[Ron Kinner]

There was a similar problem on this forum a few weeks ago. He couldn't get to sun.com. Can you use a browser to go to hotmail.com?

http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/QuestionAnswer/1,,0x1b87b47b9a27d6118ff40090279cd0f9,00.html

Ron

[Szabolcs Torok]

Hi Ron

The isue you pointed is not what I'm looking for, I can browse hotmail.com from my box with no problems. The e-mails are not working, this is the problem. And only the outgoing e-mails to hotmail. I can receive e-mails from hotmail. I'll search again my firewall settings maybe there's the solution.

If you have any other ideeas, tell me, I must solve this problem, because it's waiting for a month...

Szabi

[Szabolcs Torok]

Hi all!

Finally I solved the problem: as I felt, the solution was in the firewall settings (!), where I have separate rules for each nameserver in resolv.conf . Now I changed those rules with only one, that allows my linuxbox to connect to any IP adress's 53 port. And hotmail works just fine!
Weird isn't it?

That's it.
Anyway, thanks for the hints, maybe I'll come back with other nightmares :-)

Szabi

[Ron Kinner]

I'm glad you solved your problem but if you plan to come back with another problem you might want to assign a few points before you do. One of the reason this forum doesn't get the responses that the HP-UX one does it that it has a bad rep for not assigning points so most of the big hats ignore it.

Seems silly I guess but the peer recognition and feedback from points is what drives a lot of us to participate in the forum.

Ron