Topic: Success using ETRN thru Pacbell internet

[Gregg]

Is anybody out there using ETRN with Pacbell internet thru a DSL or dialup?  I cant make it work and cant find anybody at Pacbell that knows if they support ETRN.  I can only get SME V5 update 3 to retrieve the mail when set to multi-drop.
When I set it to ETRN, it doesnt seem to even try to retrieve the mail, ie I dont get any error messages, but it never gets the mail.  Any ideas?  Thanks for any help.

[Kelvin]

Gregg,

ETRN is something that your ISP must support before you can use it. If your ISP has it but don't know it, I'd be wary of that ISP ! Most ISPs I've come across on my end do not want to support ETRN and as such I rely a lot on multi-drop.

Kelvin

[Gregg]

Kelvin,

Thanks for your reply.  Do you have the problems that are mentioned in the manual with the multidrop setting?  My ISP is the local telephone company. They are huge but impossible to find anyone who actually knows what they are talking about.  They claim there is nothing to set up on their end and it should just work since I am not asking them to direct all my mail to my server automatically.  It is just like a dialup where my server logs on and retrieves it.  I admit I am a little unsure of the practical difference between multidrop and ETRN at their end.  Thanks for any info.

Gregg

[Kelvin]

Hi Gregg,

I'm no expert but from what I understand of it :-

Multidrop - the ISP hosting your domain mail sets it up so that any mail intended for your domain name (ie. someone@yourdomain.com) is routed into a single POP3 mailbox for you to collect. It is then up to your mail server program (whether Windows based or something like SME) to log on and collect all mail that's in that mailbox as if it were a normal POP3 mailbox. However, your mail server then needs to examine the headers of the incoming mail and decide how to distribute them locally.

ETRN - I'm not really sure but I think ETRN requires your mail server to establish a connection to the ISP's mail server then send a 'trigger' command (or something to that effect) to signal the ISP's mail server to begin dequeueing the mail that was waiting for your collection. Again, my own info on this is sketchy at best because since every other ISP I've come across don't support it, I've just stuck with multi-drop. Admittedly, I did not pursue the thing in depth.

Kelvin