Package: nullmailer
Version: 1.00RC7-22
I'm running nullmailer on debian sarge on many systems. They all use a
central machine, running Sendmail 8.13.4-3 as their mail relay.
I find that nullmailer will keep re-trying a message despite receiving a
permanent SMTP error from the mail relay.
For example, if I send an email to a non-existent user with:
$ echo "test" | mailx -s "Bad Address Test" -v [EMAIL PROTECTED]
This mail is shown in nullmailer's queue as:
$ mailq
2005-09-20 11:06:13 328 bytes
On the central mail server, we see that nullmailer is continually trying to
send to the non-existent user every minute:
Sep 20 11:06:13 mercury mta-daemon[22077]: j8KA6DrS022077:
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>... User unknown
Sep 20 11:06:13 mercury mta-daemon[22081]: j8KA6DIu022081:
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>... User unknown
Sep 20 11:07:13 mercury mta-daemon[22097]: j8KA7DHj022097:
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>... User unknown
Sep 20 11:08:13 mercury mta-daemon[22277]: j8KA8DqD022277:
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>... User unknown
Sep 20 11:09:13 mercury mta-daemon[22938]: j8KA9DTI022938:
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>... User unknown
Sep 20 11:10:13 mercury mta-daemon[23092]: j8KAADXJ023092:
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>... User unknown
Sep 20 11:11:13 mercury mta-daemon[23103]: j8KABD9X023103:
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>... User unknown
Sep 20 11:12:13 mercury mta-daemon[23138]: j8KACDUM023138:
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>... User unknown
Sniffing an SMTP exchange shows the following ("<" means data from the mail
server, and ">" means data to the mail server):
TCP Handshake
< 220 mercury ESMTP Ready
> HELO helium.nta-monitor.com
< 250 mercury.nta-monitor.com Hello argon.nta-monitor.com [192.168.124.7],
pleased to meet you
> MAIL FROM:<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
< 250 2.1.0 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>... Sender ok
> RCPT TO:<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
< 550 5.1.1 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>... User unknown
TCP Closedown
There are three issues here, from most to least serious:
a) nullmailer is ignoring the 550 permanent SMTP error, and is re-trying
the message later;
b) The message never appears to time out from the queue - I've seen
messages that are months old still queued; and
c) nullmailer closes the TCP connection without sending a QUIT.
Regards,
Roy Hills
--
Roy Hills Tel: +44 1634 721855
NTA Monitor Ltd FAX: +44 1634 721844
14 Ashford House, Beaufort Court,
Medway City Estate, Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Rochester, Kent ME2 4FA, UK WWW: http://www.nta-monitor.com/
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