[Mimedefang] Deadline for SPF records *long w/morbid horoscope*

[Jeff Rife]

On 10 Aug 2004 at 14:29, Ben Kamen wrote:

> >>If your ISP allows you to have mail servers behind theirs and they are 
> >>the "front line MX" and forward everything to you, then your ISP is 
> >>really odd.
> > 
> > 
> > This is not odd at all. 
> 
> I concur.
> 
> This is not odd at all and is actually the goal of people like MSN.com. To their 
> mail server, your mail server could be an MTA, MSA or MUA. They don't care... 
> they'll take anything.

I don't think this is true about MSN.com.  Yes, you could have your MSN 
account forward to your "real" account, or you could use something like 
fetchmail to retrieve your MSN mail and drop it into your local 
sendmail queue and then do whatever you want.

But, the MSN.com mailserver doesn't accept all mail for "mydomain.com" 
and then pass it on to a lower-numbered MX for "mydomain.com".  This is 
because MSN isn't a "real" ISP...they only provide service to 
individuals, and *only* provide one domain.

Now, for *real* ISPs (like, say Comcast, who provide both connectivity 
*and* service), most also will not be the MX for *your* domain, unless 
you set up the domain with them and tell them what e-mail addresses 
should be accepted for delivery.  Even so, most still won't then pass 
that on to your server...they assume you are an individual or a group 
of individuals who don't know how to set up a server...that's why they 
offer the service.

Basically, there are 2 ways to deal with domain e-mail:
  1. receive it yourself on a server you control
  2. contract out the receiving in some way

The companies that offer #2 also offer ways for you to retrieve the e-
mail with your MUA software, so they don't *want* to deal with passing 
it on to an MTA.

> Now for business accounts, that's another story.

And, most ISP accounts that involve domains that aren't the ISPs domain 
fall under this heading.

So, again, I think it's pretty odd for an ISP to be *the* MX for your 
domain but then just pass it along to your server.


--
Jeff Rife        | "I once did a news report on the dangers of 
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                 | "And the 10th guy preferred the 9 other men." 
                 |         -- "Just Shoot Me"