Topic: Email problem - User unknown in virtual alias table

[rick1908]

Server: 6.01-01
ISP:Comcast
Domain: theevansfamily.com

Problem: All emails sent to the server are returned with error 550: User unknown in virtual alias table


Here is the text of a test email I sent to the admin account from work:

----Start----
Your message did not reach some or all of the intended recipients.

      Subject:   Test: 3:16 PM from work
      Sent:   11/28/2004 3:29 PM

The following recipient(s) could not be reached:

      'admin@theevansfamily.com' on 11/28/2004 3:29 PM
            There was a SMTP communication problem with the recipient's email server.  Please contact your system administrator.
            <wpb-fs01.optsvc.com #5.5.0 smtp;550 <admin@theevansfamily.com>: User unknown in virtual alias table>

----End----

I am not really sure were to start. Can anyone help?

Sincerely,
Rick Evans

Contribs/updates added to the stock server:
W:\SME Downloads\041113-dungog\
dungog-backup-1.0-2.noarch.rpm   
dungog-cron-0.1-2.noarch.rpm   
dungog-masq-0.1-3.noarch.rpm   
dungog-proftpd-chroot-0.1-5.noarch.rpm   
dungog-rsync-0.1-13.noarch.rpm   
e-smith-rsyncd-0.0.2-01.noarch.rpm   
e-smith-usershellaccess-0.1-2.noarch.rpm   
e-smith-usershellaccess-0.1-3.noarch.rpm   
W:\SME Downloads\041113-dungog\601Updates\
fetchmail-6.2.5-1.i386.rpm   
rsync-2.6.2-1.noarch.rpm   
zlib-1.2.1.1-4.i386.rpm   
zlib-devel-1.2.1.1-4.i386.rpm   
W:\SME Downloads\041114\
dmc-mitel-raidmonitor-0.0.1-5.noarch.rpm   
man-1.5j-7.7x.0.i386.rpm   
W:\SME Downloads\041116-av\
amavis-ng-0.1.6.4-03dc.noarch.rpm   
clamav-es-0.80-01dungog.i386.rpm   
clamav-es-libs-0.80-01dungog.i386.rpm   
dungog-antivirus-1.0-1.noarch.rpm   
qmail-bsmtp-0.1-1.noarch.rpm   
W:\SME Downloads\041116-dg\
DansGuardian-2.8.0.3-1av636.i386.rpm   
dungog-dansguardian-2.8-17.noarch.rpm   
libesmtp-1.0.3r1-1.i386.rpm   
zlib-1.2.1.1-4.i386.rpm   
W:\SME Downloads\041127\
dungog-deletedoublebounce-0.1-1.noarch.rpm   
dungog-email-1.0-2.noarch.rpm   
dungog-mailblocking-1.0-3.noarch.rpm   
dungog-multipop-1.0-11.noarch.rpm   
dungog-useraccounts-0.1-5.noarch.rpm   
e-smith-userpanel-1.6.0-3.noarch.rpm   
perl-Unicode-IMAPUtf7-1.02-1.i386.rpm   
perl-Unicode-String-2.06-1.i386.rpm   
W:\SME Downloads\041127\pattern-matching\
e-smith-email-4.15.0-07gr07.noarch.rpm   
e-smith-mailfront-1.5.0-13gr06.noarch.rpm   
mailfront-0.91-3es.i386.rpm   
patternmatch.quick.txt   
perl-libnet-1.17-1.i386.rpm   
perl-Net-Server-0.85-1.i386.rpm   
perl-perl-ldap-0.31-1.i386.rpm   
sortspam-1.1.0-05.i386.rpm

[chris burnat]

check your MX records.  All three of them point to zonedit.com - one weighed 100 and the other two zero (type from you terminal dig theevansfamily.com MX).  You should have mail.theevansfamily.com (IP 66.176.189.177 - is this correct?) listed there at the lowest weight to ensure delivery.  hope it helps.

[rick1908]

Thanks for replying, if I run "dig theevansfamily.com MX", I get the following:

; <<>> DiG 9.2.1 <<>> theevansfamily.com MX
;; global options:  printcmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 30301
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;theevansfamily.com.            IN      MX

;; ANSWER SECTION:
theevansfamily.com.     86400   IN      MX      0 matrix.theevansfamily.com.

;; Query time: 80 msec
;; SERVER: 192.168.10.1#53(192.168.10.1)
;; WHEN: Mon Nov 29 06:44:20 2004
;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 59

I am not sure how to read this, but I do not see three servers or anything that points to zoneedit.

Do you understand what I am seeing? Is there anything that looks incorrect?

Thanks again for your help.

Sincerely,
Rick

[chris burnat]

if I run "dig theevansfamily.com MX"

How did you "run" it?  from command line, as root, typing "dig theevansfamily.com MX" (without "   ")?  I just done it again, and my answers are very different to yours... I cannot print from here at work, but will send you the result later tonight.  cheers  chris

[chris burnat]

here it is, I've done it from a linux box called canopus as user "all", you should do it from your server as "root":

[all@canopus1 all]$ dig theevansfamily.com MX
 
; <<>> DiG 9.2.4rc6 <<>> theevansfamily.com MX
;; global options:  printcmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 46657
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 3, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0
 
;; QUESTION SECTION:
;theevansfamily.com.            IN      MX
 
;; ANSWER SECTION:
theevansfamily.com.     7200    IN      MX      0 mail4.zoneedit.com.
theevansfamily.com.     7200    IN      MX      100 mx2.zoneedit.com.
theevansfamily.com.     7200    IN      MX      0 mail3.zoneedit.com.
 
;; Query time: 507 msec
;; SERVER: 192.168.0.3#53(192.168.0.3)
;; WHEN: Mon Nov 29 23:58:18 2004
;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 109
 
and here is your mail server:

[all@canopus1 all]$ dig mail.theevansfamily.com
 
; <<>> DiG 9.2.4rc6 <<>> mail.theevansfamily.com
;; global options:  printcmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 45546
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0
 
;; QUESTION SECTION:
;mail.theevansfamily.com.       IN      A
 
;; ANSWER SECTION:
mail.theevansfamily.com. 300    IN      A       66.176.189.177
 
;; Query time: 371 msec
;; SERVER: 192.168.0.3#53(192.168.0.3)
;; WHEN: Mon Nov 29 23:59:14 2004
;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 57

and here is your http server:

[all@canopus1 all]$ dig www.theevansfamily.com
 
; <<>> DiG 9.2.4rc6 <<>> www.theevansfamily.com
;; global options:  printcmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 29214
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0
 
;; QUESTION SECTION:
;www.theevansfamily.com.                IN      A
 
;; ANSWER SECTION:
www.theevansfamily.com. 300     IN      A       66.176.189.177

[rick1908]

I just tried it again and got the same results.

Logged in with PuTTY as root. Type the command "dig theevansfamily.com MX" without the quotes. Here is the output:

----Start Output----
login as: root
root@matrix's password:
Last login: Mon Nov 29 07:04:30 2004 from oracle.theevansfamily.com
Welcome to the Mitel Networks SME Server.
[root@matrix root]# dig theevansfamily.com MX

; <<>> DiG 9.2.1 <<>> theevansfamily.com MX
;; global options:  printcmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 63944
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 1, AUTHORITY: 0, ADDITIONAL: 0

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;theevansfamily.com.            IN      MX

;; ANSWER SECTION:
theevansfamily.com.     75409   IN      MX      0 matrix.theevansfamily.com.

;; Query time: 1 msec
;; SERVER: 192.168.10.1#53(192.168.10.1)
;; WHEN: Mon Nov 29 09:47:31 2004
;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 59

[root@matrix root]#
----End Output---

Any thoughts?

Again, I appreciate you taking the time to troubleshoot this with me.

Sincerely,
Rick Evans

[chris burnat]

OK.

1) you did not include a DNS server when installing your server which is OK, but then the command "dig" returns queries against your own DNS server.  Hence the answer you got.  Read man dig, and find an external DNS server.  I use 139.130.4.4 in Australia, and it goes like this:

[all@canopus1 all]$ dig @139.130.4.4 theevansfamily.com MX
 
; <<>> DiG 9.2.4rc6 <<>> @139.130.4.4 theevansfamily.com MX
;; global options:  printcmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 30479
;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 3, AUTHORITY: 2, ADDITIONAL: 2
 
;; QUESTION SECTION:
;theevansfamily.com.            IN      MX
 
;; ANSWER SECTION:
theevansfamily.com.     7200    IN      MX      100 mx2.zoneedit.com.
theevansfamily.com.     7200    IN      MX      0 mail3.zoneedit.com.
theevansfamily.com.     7200    IN      MX      0 mail4.zoneedit.com.
 
;; AUTHORITY SECTION:
theevansfamily.com.     7200    IN      NS      ns13.zoneedit.com.
theevansfamily.com.     7200    IN      NS      ns15.zoneedit.com.
 
;; ADDITIONAL SECTION:
mail3.zoneedit.com.     266     IN      A       216.133.67.106
mx2.zoneedit.com.       340     IN      A       64.151.77.88
 
;; Query time: 234 msec
;; SERVER: 139.130.4.4#53(139.130.4.4)
;; WHEN: Tue Nov 30 12:11:25 2004
;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 179

2) Now you can see that your MX records are not pointing to your box.  You should have an entry for mail.theevansfamily.com. with a weighting of 10 (an arbitrary low value).  Any backup servers for your mail should then have a weighting larger than 10, say one at 20 and one at 30.  Fixing your MX records will fix your problem.  After a change, wait a while, it may take up to 24 hours for DNS to propagate.  Good luck.

[rick1908]

Chris,

Thank you so much for helping me out with my email problem.

Going through your suggestions I went to zoneedit.com to make sure the domain setup was correct.

I used to have *.theevansfamily.com forwarding to my SME box. I guess that since everything went to the server, there was no problem with how my MX records were set.

About a week ago, I changed the zoneedit settings from *.theevansfamily.com to www, mail, proxy, etc. It appears that once I made the change I was required to make sure I had an MX entry.

I added the MX entry and everything is working perfect now.

Thanks again for all your help. I was puilling my hair out.

Sincerely,
Rick Evans