Topic: Email/DNS routing anomaly (REPOST)

[ber]

Hi this is a repost- have had some replies but would like some further feedback to resolve the problem. Just wanna be sure in case I mess it up- its not a great problem except for us who want to email the specific client.
Looks as though the previous post has been boosted up the list due to my post on it?? (maybe it auto-posts after a certain amount of time has elapsed??)

here is the link to the previous post...
http://forums.contribs.org/index.php/topic,48266.msg239377.html#msg239377

Hi I've got some email issues when emailing to a client whose website is hosted on our server. We cant email them as the DNS is resolving emails locally. Their emails are hosted on their server (SBS 2003).

Our server- SME 7.5 in server/gateway mode. Not absolutely certain but I'm guessing that the DNS is resolved by our Server through our ADSL Modem Router (New Zealand).

What's the best set-up so that the emails are routed to the client rather than our server.

In the admin server set-up I have not put in any addresses in the DNS option; which is the recommended option.
I'm quite certain this is a DNS issue- just unsure where exactly it is- my gut feeling is that i should enter our ISP DNS settings in rather than leaving it blank so that it resolves locally- any help appreciated.
MX records and A records are resolved correctly for all internet email and web traffic except for us who are local. Our email traffic get routed back to the SME server because the domain is hosted on it.- is there a fix??
Thanks.

[janet]

ber

You should not start new threads for an existing issue as it just spreads the information around and those trying to help you may not be aware of previous answers given, and therefore waste time by duplicating their efforts to assist.

Note that the most recent posts are brought to the top of the list.

Your question has been answered, with more than one way of resolving the issue.
It is not a DNS issue so do not add or change DNS settings.
The issue is that you want to split the hosting for a domain to different machines, web on one, mail on another and sme server needs some instructions re how to deal with that.

Personally I would check the settings for DNS for that hosted domain, in Domains panel on sme server, and set DNS to Internet DNS servers, rather than Resolve locally. This sends all local requests for that domain to external DNS servers, which will resolve www requests back to your sme server, and maybe just (meaning I'm not sure) resolve mail requests to the SBS server via the external MX records (as you already have configured those correctly). If already set to resolve to Internet DNS servers, then read on.

The "ultimate answer" for you is to "delegate mail" to another server, as already advised.
It is very easy to delegate mail to another existing mail server, everything else will stay the same & should take under 5 minutes to do from log in time to log off time.
From http://wiki.contribs.org/Email#Deliver_email_for_one_domain_to_an_internal_mail_server

db domains setprop hosteddomain.com MailServer SBSserverexternalIP
signal-event email-update

replace hosteddomain.com with your customers hosted domain name
and replace
SBSserverexternalIP with the fixed public external IP of the SBS server ie 123.456.78.90 (or whatever)


An alternative approach is to NOT configure the "whole" hosted domain on SME server.
Only configure the www part ie www.hosteddomain.com and NOT hosteddomain.com
Do this in the Domains panel, and you can check entries in the Hostnames and Addresses panel

As I interpret Charlies advice, this means that http://www.hosteddomain.com/ will resolve to the hosted web site on sme server, but http://hosteddomain.com/ will not resolve, but you can provide local workarounds (redirects) for that if preferred.
So mail sent to hosteddomain.com will follow the external MX records and be delivered to the SBS server, as that domain name does not exist on your sme server.

I think it's simpler just to setup mail delegation for that one domain in question.