RH8.0 - when I try to send out an email I get 'Connection refused by <name of my RH server I am sending from>'. Can this be a firewall issue. I'm thinking I had this problem some time ago but cannot find my notes as to how it was resolved. Any ideas?

Thanks! j-me

Assuming you have internet access and are able to browse the web, yes this could be a firewall problem. Check the OUTPUT chain of your filter table with 'iptables -t filter -L OUTPUT' and ensure that you either aren't restricting outbound connections, or that SMTP is allowed out from your machine.

output:

target prot opt source destination

Is this "prot" what you are talking about? Do I need to change it? How?

Hi J-me!

I suspect it has got nothing to do with your firewall, since your mail server is running on the same host as that from whihc you are sending the mail, correct?

If you are using sendmail, you probably have forgotten to configure the file --

#*****************************************************************************#
#
# file : /etc/mail/local-host-names
#
#*---------------------------------------------------------------------------*#
#
# All alias names (CNAME and MX records) for the localhost must be included.
#
#.............................................................................#
#

prot is for 'protocol'. The listing you've shown indicates that you've got no output filtering. This is good.

Perhaps sendmail isn't running or listening on the loopback interface. Try running

netstat -a -n -p | grep ':25'

and see what you get. If it is not listening, but started, you'll need to adjust an option in sendmail.cf (using an m4 macro) called DAEMON_OPTIONS.

I am sending outside the firewall to a third party exchange server.
I ran the netstat and got:
tcp 0 0 127.0.0.1:25 0.0.0.0:* LISTEN 649/sendmail: accep

I tried telnet smptemail 25 and was able to send email fine. sendmail seems to not be configured properly. I have done nothing with it since I installed so any ideas?

Thanks. j-me

What about the idea I posted in post #4?

The fact that it is only listing 127.0.0.1:25 means that it is only going to connect if you 'telnet 127.0.0.1 25'. But, if you try to connect using 'telnet 1.2.3.4 25' it will timeout because sendmail isn't working on this 'interface'. You need to edit your /etc/sendmail.mc (or similar, I can't be certain where your origonal .mc file is) and change

DAEMON_OPTIONS(`Port=smtp,Addr=127.0.0.1, Name=MTA')

and add below it

DAEMON_OPTIONS(`Port=smtp,Addr=1.2.3.4, Name=MTA')

Then, build your .cf file with

m4 /etc/sendmail.mc > /etc/sendmail.cf

Then, restart sendmail

/etc/rc.d/init.d/sendmail restart

Then, try that netstat command again. This time, if you are a pimp, you'll see

tcp 0 0 127.0.0.1:25 0.0.0.0:* LISTEN 666/sendmail: accep
tcp 0 0 1.2.3.4:25 0.0.0.0:* LISTEN 666/sendmail: accep

And now you'll be able to connect to the SMTP server from outside the box. 'telnet 1.2.3.4 25' will work.

This is a change in the default configuration of sendmail on RedHat. I had to do this with my box, and it should work for you, too.

Good luck.

And if you are using the latest sendmail with the clientmqueue
submission daemon, you will also need to add the line

FEATURE(`msp', `[your_host.your_domain.COM]')dnl

to the end of /etc/mail/submit.mc

and do not forget to do a

# cd /etc/mail
# make clean
# make

to regenerate you sendmail.cf and submit.cf

okay I editted sendmail.mc.
typed #m4 /etc/mail/sendmail > /etc/mail/sendmail.cf

error message:
/etc/mail/sendmail.mc:8: m4: Cannot open /usr/share/sendmail-cf/m4/cf.m4: No such file or directory

I check /usr/share and sure enough there is no sendmail-cf directory.
# rpm -q sendmail
sendmail-8.12.5-7
# rpm -q m4
m4-1.4.1-11

Is this issue new with RH 8.0 cause I do not remember having so much trouble with 7.3? sendmail just worked with very little changes.

I found the reason why I could not get m4 to run. should read a little more. now that I've fixed that, ran m4 and restarted sendmail. Still no email sent. On a whim I installed RH7.3 on a laptop and, without any configuration of sendmail, I tested this same issue. It worked! AUGH! The issue is with 8.0 but how do I work around it? Download the latest 8.12.9 and discard RH8.0 sendmail distro. I think I'm gong to give that a try.

Thanks! j-me

And how about editing the /etc/mail/submit.mc file as I suggested?

Corin,

I did edit submit.mc:
FEATURE(`msp', `[your_host.your_domain.COM]')dnl

I understand it to be
FEATURE(`msp', `myhost.mydomain.COM')dnl
Is this correct?
In /etc/mail I did a
# make clean
# make
# lsl (verified date/time stamp changed for submit.cf)
# /etc/rc.d/init.d/sendmail restart

tried to resend mail
# mail -s test2 <address>

I check /var/log and now I get no attempt to send mail.
I even tried lower-case .com. same result.

One thing I noticed in previous attempts compared to those server that work using 7.3, the maillog relay=outlook.kfbs.com.
On 8.0 maillog, the relay is my server I am trying to send from.
(relay=3wtlap.kfbs.com) Just a difference that may be worth noting.

Am I just doing something wrong?

Thanks for your patience and help. j-me

okay, found out what was wrong. It IS working!!! 8)

Thank you all very much!

j-me

For our benefit and other readers of this thread, please could you post what you did to solve the problem?

When other people who have a similar problem read this thread, it would be very helpful for them to see what was your solution.

Sorry Corin. Just read this message.
What I did to resolve this issue is to run:
# make clean
# make submit

and sent an email. It worked!

Thanks!