Date: Thu, 20 Nov 1997 18:27:47 +0000 (GMT) From: Terry Lambert <tlambert@primenet.com> To: brian@awfulhak.org (Brian Somers) Cc: tlambert@primenet.com, sef@kithrup.com, hackers@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Mail spam, sigh... Message-ID: <199711201827.LAA09983@usr01.primenet.com> In-Reply-To: <199711200143.BAA14262@awfulhak.demon.co.uk> from "Brian Somers" at Nov 20, 97 01:43:26 am
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> > I have yet to see a clean way to make this work with a transiently > > connected system. I'd guess that the majority of users are on > > transiently connected systems (note: I did not say the majority of > > FreeBSD boxes). > > I'm on a `transiently connected' system and now happily use the stuff > in /etc/mail (introduced for 2.2.5). My objective is to figure out > the HACK()s (Mike Burgett has already shown me some examples) and put > 'em in the FAQ - unless someone gets there in front of me (I've got > lots of other stuff to keep be busy with at the moment too). > > > We need to start thinking about a set of "out of the box" configurations: > [.....] > > I'm not sure I understand the rationale here. What's the difference > between a ``permanent'' and ``sometimes'' link (unless you're subtly > referring to the fact that most if not all of these rules are done in > the canonification stage, and many ``sometimes'' sites have > FEATURE(nocanonify)) ? If we get something working for the > ``sometimes'' sites, why wouldn't it also work with the ``permanent'' > sites ? Because you can't do DNS lookups when your link is down, and using "fetchmail" or "qpopper" or "poplookup" to get your mail enqueues it locally instead of delivering it immediately, and by the time "sendmail -q" runs for queue processing, you have no way to do DNS lookups? Or that DNS lookups need to occur on local machines requesting to send email, but, again, your link may not be up if you are batching the mail to send it during a periodic connect, so you can't DNS lookup your local machines? Or you are acting as a "store-and-forward" site for a bunch of low cost (ie: local 28.8 phone calls) links (each site which the rules would require a DNS lookup on), and you yourself are transiently connected through a shared high cost (ie: PAC Bell or US West metered rate ISDN *and*/*or* long distance 28.8 toll call) link? Or you are connecteD 2B+d ISDN, and your 9600 baud channel is up for inbound connections, and outbound connection bring up the higher cost ISDN link, so you can get mail, but you can't do DNS lookups? There are others, like one FreeBSD box and the husband/wife/son/daugther's Windows 95 box using you as a "smarter host" -- ie: they are trying to relay through you. It's a bad idea to lock these out in the default configuration. Terry Lambert terry@lambert.org --- Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present or previous employers.
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