Re: [exim] Retries to ox.ac.uk

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Author: Philip Hazel
Date:  
To: John Hall
CC: Tony Finch, exim-users
Subject: Re: [exim] Retries to ox.ac.uk
On Mon, 22 Aug 2005, John Hall wrote:

> There is only one MX record, oxmail.ox.ac.uk. This name resolves to many
> IP addresses, one of which is unavailable:
>
> $ host -t mx ox.ac.uk
> ox.ac.uk                MX      9 oxmail.ox.ac.uk
> $host oxmail.ox.ac.uk
> oxmail.ox.ac.uk         A       129.67.1.161
> oxmail.ox.ac.uk         A       129.67.1.163
> oxmail.ox.ac.uk         A       129.67.1.165
> oxmail.ox.ac.uk         A       129.67.1.167
> oxmail.ox.ac.uk         A       129.67.1.171   <-- this host is unavailable
> oxmail.ox.ac.uk         A       163.1.2.161
> oxmail.ox.ac.uk         A       163.1.2.163
> oxmail.ox.ac.uk         A       163.1.2.165
> oxmail.ox.ac.uk         A       163.1.2.167

>
> > You haven't provided enough information about your problem message for me
> > to be able to say anything useful. We don't seem to have any problems with
> > ox.ac.uk from here.
>
> The message itself is unremarkable. Exim is attempting to connect to
> 129.67.1.171, which times out.
>
> 2005-08-22 14:15:49 oxmail.ox.ac.uk [129.67.1.171]: Connection timed out
> 2005-08-22 14:15:49 xxx.yyy@??? <xxx.yyy@???>
> R=internet T=remote_smtp defer (110): Connection timed out
>
> Exim doesn't seem to retry any of the other IP addresses listed for
> oxmail.ox.ac.uk.


Please try a delivery with debugging turned on, catch the stderr output,
and see if that gives you a clue. If not, post the output so we can see
if we (the list) can figure it out. Something like

exim -d -M the-message-id 2>/tmp/something

What it *should* do is try the hosts in a random order, unless they are
*all* dead and it hasn't hit a retry time for any of the others. You
could also try running

exinext ox.ac.uk

to see if that provides anything helpful.


-- 
Philip Hazel            University of Cambridge Computing Service,
ph10@???      Cambridge, England. Phone: +44 1223 334714.
Get the Exim 4 book:    http://www.uit.co.uk/exim-book