How to properly cfg tcpip, mail, smtp to allow system mail sent to internet

[Victor Mendham]

Trying to get OpenVMS 7.3-1 to send system messages to e-mail, anyone know what I'm missing...

Generic server queue TCPIP$SMTP_YOGIBEAR_00

Entry Jobname Username Blocks Status
----- ------- -------- ------ ------
1 03082815355061_SYSTEM-1277
SYSTEM 5 Holding until 29-AUG-2003 11:45:42
7 03082717175824_SYSTEM-663
SYSTEM 5 Holding until 29-AUG-2003 12:01:50

Server queue TCPIP$SMTP_YOGIBEAR_01, idle, on YOGIBEAR::, mounted form DEFAULT
YOGIBEAR>
YOGIBEAR>
YOGIBEAR>
YOGIBEAR>tcpip
TCPIP> sho servi

Service Port Proto Process Address State

FTP 21 TCP TCPIP$FTP 0.0.0.0 Enabled
LPD 515 TCP TCPIP$LPD 0.0.0.0 Enabled
SMTP 25 TCP TCPIP$SMTP 0.0.0.0 Enabled
TELNET 23 TCP not defined 0.0.0.0 Enabled
TCPIP>
TCPIP> sho config smtp

SMTP Configuration
Options
Initial interval: 0 00:30:00.00 Address_max: 16 NOEIGHT_BIT
Retry interval: 0 01:00:00.00 Hop_count_max: 16 NORELAY
Maximum interval: 3 00:00:00.00 TOP_HEADERS

Timeout Initial Mail Receipt Data Terminate
Send: 5 5 5 3 10
Receive: 5

Alternate gateway: not defined
General gateway: HANNA

Substitute domain: not defined
Zone: HANNA.BARBARA.COM

Postmaster: TCPIP$SMTP
Log file: SYS$SPECIFIC:[TCPIP$SMTP]TCPIP$SMTP_LOGFILE.LOG

Generic queue Queues Participating nodes

TCPIP$SMTP_YOGIBEAR_00 1 YOGIBEAR
TCPIP>

MAIL>
Date: Thr, 28 Aug 2003 21:41:20 -0300 (ADT)
Message-Id: <03070821412060@HANNA.BARABARA.COM>
From: TCPIP$SMTP@HANNA.BARABARA.COM
To: system@HANNA.BARABARA.COM
Subject: Returned mail


---- Transcript of session follows ----

%TCPIP-E-SMTP_UNREACHABL, cannot connect to remote host, sympatico.ca
-SYSTEM-F-UNREACHABLE, remote node is not currently reachable

---- Unsent message follows ----

Date: Mon, 25 Aug 2003 21:04:14 -0300 (ADT)
Message-Id: <03070521041465@HANNA.BARABARA.COM>
From: system@HANNA.BARABARA.COM

so far I have enabled the smtp service in SMTP, set the gateway to HANNA, set the zone to HANNA.BARBARA.COM and then tried to send an e-mail to myself. Did Imissing something, because I can nslookup hanna.barbara.com and ping it.

[Martin P.J. Zinser]

Tell us a bit more about your setup. I hanna.barabara.com a registered domain with a public DNS entry or an "internal" domain name and you are connecting to the internet via DSL/cable modem? Have you setup an MX record for the domain?

[Mark Hollinger]

Since you defined a gateway, you're probably behind a firewall that won't let your OpenVMS system make direct outbound SMTP connections. However, you probably want to define the alternate gateway, not the general gateway.

The "general gateway" exists for historical reasons but is actually not very useful. At least 90% of the time, the only SMTP gateway you need is the "alternate gateway".

- M

[Martin P.J. Zinser]

Looking up barbara.com with whois I do seriously doubt that this is the domain you re-present to the outside. If this is the case you also will need a substitute domain (look for hidden in the help).

[Victor Mendham]

For security reasons, I changed the name of our information. I'll I have setup is started SMTP in TCP/IP and set gateway and zone. This is not firewall related as a Tru64 box with same ip is working fine. Can anyone post a "show config smtp" cfg that works, so that I can take a look and test a few settings?

[Martin P.J. Zinser]

SMTP Configuration
Options
Initial interval: 0 00:30:00.00 Address_max: 16 NOEIGHT_BIT
Retry interval: 0 01:00:00.00 Hop_count_max: 16 NORELAY
Maximum interval: 3 00:00:00.00 TOP_HEADERS

Timeout Initial Mail Receipt Data Terminate
Send: 5 5 5 3 10
Receive: 5

Alternate gateway: not defined
General gateway: not defined

Substitute domain: HIDDEN, ZINSER.NO-IP.INFO
Zone: not defined

Postmaster: TCPIP$SMTP
Log file: SYS$SPECIFIC:[TCPIP$SMTP]TCPIP$SMTP_LOGFILE.LOG

Generic queue Queues Participating nodes

TCPIP$SMTP_KORONA_00 1 KORONA



This does work for me :-)
Config: Private class A network (No, I do not have that many systems at home). VMS system connected via Cable/DSL router to a cable modem . Address translation/MX record provided by No-IP.
Your config might be different, but since you have not said to much about it yet this is pretty much the best you can expect ;-)

[Willem Grooters]

I join the question, since it's not clear to me either.
From my VMS system, I found mail will sometimes work fine, other times it won't. Even more obscuring: if there are multiple recepienst specified, sometimes none is reached, sometimes some, sometimes all...
and NOTHING is signalled to "postmaster".
Local mail is not a problem. It's just outgoing mail that troubles me.
My config is like Martin's: VMS to router (= default gateway), over ADSL-modem to ISP.
My mail config is almost like Martin's as well, the only real differences are Alternate gateway is specified (SMTPserver at ISP), and I have no substitute domain (since my intranet is a subdomain of my own). Postmaster is SYSTEM (for the moment) - and I know this works.
My ISP holds authoritive DNS for my domain, and currently, I'm only SENDING, not receiving mail - so ISP will not specify my node(s) in MX record.
It _could_ be DNS, I had it checked by a collegue but he didn't find anything weird.
Could it be that "SMTP" must be specified somewhere in mail config? I know that there are several possibilities in VMSMAIL, but couldn't find a real place where to specify it.

[Martin P.J. Zinser]

Hello Willem,

check the logfiles they can be quite enlightning ;-). The locattion is shown in the show config. Besides you certainly want to check if the Gateway might be down when you experience these problems. One thing to make sure is that your address backtranslates correctly since many mail servers reject mails (silently) nowadays in case this does not work as an anti-spam measure.

Greetings, Martin

[Willem Grooters]

Martin,
Gateway porblems? Hardly. It's the very same SMTP-server (at ISP) as I use for my Outlook client on a PC. And that does NOT give a problem. It it were a back-translation problem, it would block all messages, not just some...
I just thought: could be my firewall. Incoming requests are shut on port 25 (SMTP), since I'm only sending it would not be a problem (i thought). Unless, of course, it's a 2-way port....Easy check (tonight).

[Martin P.J. Zinser]

Hello Willem,

since you are talking via a Gateway anyhow your firewall schould not be the issue. I really suggest to check all the log files in sys$scpecfic:[tcpip$smtp] (assuming you are running hps TCP/IP product).
Also not all SMTP servers do require succesfull backtranslation, so you can only exclude this if it sometimes works/not works for the same email recipient.

Greetings, Martin

[Willem Grooters]

Victor, I followed Mark's recommendation and removed my alternate gateway and the REALLY helped (Thanks Mark - it works!)
So what _might_ help:
- Don't specify any gateway.
- Just /ZONE - NO domain. It will default to one level up the domain you're in. Eg. My VMS box is in INTRANET.MYSITE.NL, so /Zone would render to MYSITE.NL - exactly what I want.
- If you require a specific reply account, speceify with /SUBSTITUTE_DOMAIN.
Take a look at the attachment. Whether this works is likely to depend on your network environment, so I cannot guarantee it will work. For me, it does.

[Victor Mendham]

I'm still having a problem, any internet mail address I put in an e-mail seems to fail with

%TCPIP-E-SMTP_UNKHST, remote host unknown, sympatico.ca
-SYSTEM-F-NOSUCHNODE, remote node is unknown

I tried to open a support call with HP today, but we don't seem to have support on TCP/IP.

So the only thing I have setup is a zone with my mail server relay address like "hanna.barbara.com"

so I guess my next question is when I enter my e-mail into mail is it like so...
mail
mail> send
to: victor.mendham@sympatico.ca or

smtp%"victor.mendham@sympatico.ca"

When I'm using Multinet I set my forwarding address as smtp%::"""victor.mendham@sympatico.ca"" and only one set of quotes appears when you perform a show forward in mail.

Regards, Vic...

Thanks.

[Martin P.J. Zinser]

Hello Vic,

you really need to give us more of your config if you expect to get help here, i.e.

- Is your internal domain name/IP address range officially registered, or do you do some kind of NAT to translate it to outside values?
- How are you connected to the internet? Do you run your own gateway? Is it located at an ISP? If you do need to use a gateway you really, really want to define the alternate, not the general gateway.

Greetings, Martin

[Willem Grooters]

Victor,
you _should_ check if the domain you're trying us contact, is accessable, either using some known name (WWW.sime.domain, for example), try to PING that (BY NAME). It _should_ at least translate to an address. Or run NSLOOKUP (mcr TCPIP$NSLOOKUP) looking for the domain you're looking for, especially for MX (SHOW MX).
If it doesn't show up, you cannot send a mail that way.
If you have trouble accessing the internet on that address, have a look at your routing tables.

[Roger Lyon · Accepted solution]

Hi Victor,

If your situation is anything like mine, I specify the alternate gateway to point to my company's SMTP server. The network is designed to only allow mail outbound to the Internet from this server. The network DNS has a domain reference back to my system so return mail can be processed.

As for the way you enter address, it doesn't seem to matter with or without the quotes. You really only need the SMTP% prefix if you are mixing VMS local mail with SMTP mail addresses, at least in my experience.

Here is how I have it configured. I have not had any problems with this.

Alternate gateway: SMTP3
General gateway: not defined

Substitute domain: not defined
Zone: not defined

Postmaster: TCPIP$SMTP

Roger

[Victor Mendham]

Roger,

I think you're cfg is the correct one. I spoke to HP and yes indeed, I needed an alternate gateway not a general gateway or a zone. I implemented and tested and it works great.. Here is the reply from HP- hopefully it doesn't get chopped.

The first thing to correct is the gateway. You have specified a GENERAL gateway for smtp which is used to handle non-smtp mail.
You should use the ALTERNATE gateway setting instead.

I'm going to assume you are running TCPIP version 5.something. If not, please replace all occurences of TCPIP with UCX.

$ TCPIP SET CONFIG SMTP/NOGENERAL_PURPOSE
$ TCPIP SET CONFIG SMTP/GATEWAY=ALTERNATE=ip_address_of_the_mail_server
$ TCPIP SET CONFIG SMTP/NOZONE

Stop and restart mail to see if this helps.

$ TCPIP STOP MAIL
$ TCPIP START MAIL

When you send a message from the vms system, it will be received by the other end with the following in the from field:
username@vmshostname.domain. Depending on how the mail server is configured, this may cause a problem and be rejected. You can remove the
hostname by setting a susbtitute domain. The message will now be received from username@domain. The downside to this is that the
receiving client/user will NOT be able to reply to the message.

$ TCPIP SET CONFIG SMTP /SUBS=(HIDDEN, NAME=domain_name)
$ TCPIP STOP MAIL
$ TCPIP START MAIL

If the above fails, turn on debugging and send me the results:

$ TCPIP STOP MAIL
$ DEFINE/SYSTEM TCPIP$SMTP_LOG_LEVEL 5
$ TCPIP START MAIL
* send a message, wait for it to fail
$ TCPIP STOP MAIL
$ DEASSIGN/SYSTEM TCPIP$SMTP_LOG_LEVEL
* the log file is ....
SYS$SPECIFIC:[TCPIP$SMTP]TCPIP$SMTP_LOGFILE.LOG;
$ TCPIP SHOW VERSION
$ TCPIP SHOW COMM

[Willem Grooters]

One remark on HP's answer:
given that your domain is BARBARA.COM, and your machine is HANNA.BARBARA.COM, mail will be sent as 'Viktor@hanna.barbara.com'.

You _could_ specify

TCPIP SET CONFIG SMTP/ZONE

just like that, and your email-address would be shown as 'viktor@barabara.com'. It requires a MX-record at your provider (but that would already exist).

From the documenation I recall that /SUBSTITUTE_DOMAIN refers to the POSTMASTER recipient. If you make this the same as the zone (so BARBARA.COM) a reply would be possible (given BARBARA.COM is know as destination)