Mail problem: could use some hints

Hi there


Patrick Holthuizen wrote:

> Do you have any experience with KPN direct?

No, I don't.
Knowing telcos, they might suddenly change your ip address. Or block
certain ports. Without telling anyone of course.
I would only use their product in combination with a tunnel.


Regards,
Rob
--
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| The EU constitution will turn the EU into a SU |
| Vote against the EU constitution in the referendum |
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+

I have now sent four mails to Planet Internet during the past two weeks.
No reply whatsoever.

The idea of using a tunnel is starting to appeal to me.
However, the domain registration started three months ago.
Any chance of undoing the contract and moving my domain?
Does anyone have experience.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I solved the mail problem by changing the timeout of RFC1413 requests from
30 to 20 seconds.
My guess is that Planets mail-relay does not accept Ident requensts.
As a result, my server will wait the full 30 seconds before replying to the
SMTP greeting of the Planet server.
If Planets mailserver has a timeout of less than 31 seconds for the SMTP
greeting, then this will trigger the synchronization error in exims logfile.

However, I find it strange that the timeout on Planets server would be so
short. The standard timeout for SMTP greetings is 5 minutes!
If the timeout is indeed so short, Planet does not comply to internet standards.
Moreover, it makes the Planet server look like a SPAM-server.

I asked Planet if my analysis and my solution makes any sense.
Obviously, no reply (do they even have e-mail?)
Therefore, I would like to ask this group: does my analysis make sense?
Do you have any experience with the servers of Planet Internet?
Is the solution robust enough or should I switch of RFC1413 requests altogether?


Thanks for the help

Arij van Berkel

Hi there


"A.I. van Berkel" wrote:

> I have now sent four mails to Planet Internet during the past two weeks.
> No reply whatsoever.

That figures.

> The idea of using a tunnel is starting to appeal to me.
> However, the domain registration started three months ago.
> Any chance of undoing the contract and moving my domain?
> Does anyone have experience.

They fucked up, which is probably a breach of contract.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> I solved the mail problem by changing the timeout of RFC1413 requests from
> 30 to 20 seconds.
> My guess is that Planets mail-relay does not accept Ident requensts.
> As a result, my server will wait the full 30 seconds before replying to the
> SMTP greeting of the Planet server.
> If Planets mailserver has a timeout of less than 31 seconds for the SMTP
> greeting, then this will trigger the synchronization error in exims logfile.

Which is behavour typical of malware.

> However, I find it strange that the timeout on Planets server would be so
> short. The standard timeout for SMTP greetings is 5 minutes!
> If the timeout is indeed so short, Planet does not comply to internet standards.
> Moreover, it makes the Planet server look like a SPAM-server.

Just like blocking port 25, their behaveour interferes with standart
anti spam / malware measures.
Again, typical of PI.

> I asked Planet if my analysis and my solution makes any sense.
> Obviously, no reply (do they even have e-mail?)
> Therefore, I would like to ask this group: does my analysis make sense?
> Do you have any experience with the servers of Planet Internet?
> Is the solution robust enough or should I switch of RFC1413 requests altogether?

The only thing that doesn't make sense is doing busyness with PI.
They are a bunch of mindless jerks who belong in an institution for the
criminaly insane.


Regards,
Rob
--
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| The EU constitution will turn the EU into a SU |
| Vote against the EU constitution in the referendum |
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+

A.I. van Berkel wrote:
> I have now sent four mails to Planet Internet during the past two weeks.
> No reply whatsoever.

It's about the same for me. I am going to change providers due to their
"helpful" attitude.

> The idea of using a tunnel is starting to appeal to me.
> However, the domain registration started three months ago.
> Any chance of undoing the contract and moving my domain?
> Does anyone have experience.

Technically it's so easy to move your domain, though financially you
will have to check your contract's fine print. In the worst case you
have your stuff working again and just undo the contract after it's
first year.

> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> I solved the mail problem by changing the timeout of RFC1413 requests from
> 30 to 20 seconds.
> My guess is that Planets mail-relay does not accept Ident requensts.
> As a result, my server will wait the full 30 seconds before replying to the
> SMTP greeting of the Planet server.
> If Planets mailserver has a timeout of less than 31 seconds for the SMTP
> greeting, then this will trigger the synchronization error in exims logfile.
>
> However, I find it strange that the timeout on Planets server would be so
> short. The standard timeout for SMTP greetings is 5 minutes!
> If the timeout is indeed so short, Planet does not comply to internet standards.
> Moreover, it makes the Planet server look like a SPAM-server.

I added the line following line to the exim.conf file after reading your
message and now it works for me too:

rfc1413_query_timeout = 0s

So thank you for the hint!!!!

I guess planet's firewall has an open port 113 but doesn't respond to
it. :-(
So in my opinion Planet has a wrong configuration, they should either:
- Close port 113 so you get a reset instead of a timeout or...
- Respond to requests on port 113 in a timely manner or...
- Keep sending the message after a standard 30sec timeout.

> I asked Planet if my analysis and my solution makes any sense.
> Obviously, no reply (do they even have e-mail?)
> Therefore, I would like to ask this group: does my analysis make sense?
> Do you have any experience with the servers of Planet Internet?
> Is the solution robust enough or should I switch of RFC1413 requests altogether?

I will send them my finding too, just for their knowledge. I'm going to
switch ISP anyway for the reason given above. I contect XS4ALL and they
seem alot more serious about their technical quality than Planet.

Arij, still thank you for your information on this news group!!!

Sincerely,
Patrick Holthuizen