We've seen a weird problem today between our central mail exchanger and our two
big Unix boxes who have recently converted to Exim (from sendmail). It seems
that the central mailer, oxmail1, peridically throws a wobbly for a few minutes
and stops accepting mail *from* the two Unix boxes, sable and ermine, who both
use oxmail1 as their "smart host" and fling all their mail off to it for
rewriting . Even though oxmail1 won't accept mail from them it continues to
send mail *to* sable and ermine during those few minutes. The messages that
sable and ermine try to send to oxmail1 never make it far enough into oxmail1's
Exim to get logged but this is how a typical entry appears in the logs on sable
and ermine:
On sable:
1998-08-27 13:05:16 0zC0nj-0001Je-00 <= trin0072@??? U=trin0072 P=loc
al S=952 id=19980827130707.A1254@???
1998-08-27 13:05:16 0zC0nj-0001Je-00 => trin0072 <trin0072@???> D=loc
aluser T=local_delivery
1998-08-27 13:05:16 0zC0nj-0001Je-00 Malformed SMTP response from oxmail1.ox.ac.
uk [129.67.1.1] after initial connection
1998-08-27 13:05:16 0zC0nj-0001Je-00 == Dominic.Hughes@??? T=remote_
smtp defer (-20): Malformed SMTP response from oxmail1.ox.ac.uk [129.67.1.1] aft
er initial connection
1998-08-27 13:05:16 0zC0nj-0001Je-00 == corin@??? T=remote_smtp defe
r (-20): Malformed SMTP response from oxmail1.ox.ac.uk [129.67.1.1] after initia
l connection
And on ermine:
1998-08-27 13:05:16 0zC0nk-000674-00 <= wolf0100@??? U=wolf0100 P=lo
cal S=471
1998-08-27 13:05:16 0zC0nk-000674-00 Malformed SMTP response from oxmail1.ox.ac.
uk [129.67.1.1] after initial connection
1998-08-27 13:05:16 0zC0nk-000674-00 == caroline.harding@??? T=remote_s
mtp defer (-20): Malformed SMTP response from oxmail1.ox.ac.uk [129.67.1.1] afte
r initial connection
The outgoing messages are simply queued on sable and ermine until after a few
minutes (with no intervention) everything returns to normal and oxmail1
evidently stops giving this "Malformed SMTP response" and processes mail as
normal.
Have you ever seen this before? Ermine and sable are both on v2.02 whilst
oxmail1 is on v1.90.
Many thanks,
Elena
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~ Elena Blanco Oxford University Computing Services,
~ 13 Banbury Road, Oxford, England.
~ elena.blanco@??? Tel: +44 1865 273250
--
*** Exim information can be found at
http://www.exim.org/ ***
