On Mon, 29 Jun 1998, Carlos Carvalho wrote: : Hi folks, : : I asked some days ago here how to make another machine hold the mail : while the main mail server is down. People told me to put another MX : record in the dns to point to the temporary machine. : : Sure this is necessary, but I don't think it's enough. First, the temp : machine must recognize all users, otherwise it'll bounce the message. : Second, I'd like it to not only queue the mail but *dump it on the : main one when it comes up*. If I just put the MX record, the secondary : will hold the mail in IT'S /var/spool/mail, and users will not : automatically get it.
Huh? MX records are Mail eXchange records - this is what they were designed for. Let's say host A has an MX preference of 10, and host B has a preference of 20. As long as a machine can deliver mail to host A, host B will never see it - the mail will be delivered directly to host A, and the MTA there will deliver the mail locally (or do whatever is appropriate). Now, let's imagine that host A goes down - it is unreachable from the Internet. All mail destined for host A will now be delivered to host B. Both MX records still exist, but since host A cannot be reached host B is the next most preferred contact. Host B knows that it is not the final destination (because of the MX record for host A) so it queues the mail in /var/spool/mqueue (if it's a linux box). Host B will attempt to deliver that mail for as long as the timeout period allows. : I found a solution: For every user, put a forward in /etc/aliases : pointing directly to the main server (argh...). This works, but it's : ugly. Is there a better way (using sendmail or other MTA)? See above :) -- Nathan Norman MidcoNet - 410 South Phillips Avenue - Sioux Falls, SD 57104 mailto://[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.midco.net finger [EMAIL PROTECTED] for PGP Key: (0xA33B86E9) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]