Send but not receive emails

Halfhidden · September 28, 2017, 12:39pm

I’m guessing this has a lot to do with the way I’ve set up my server as I had issues with dns pointing to the internal address at one point.
So the problem is that after creating a virtualmin user I wanted to send emails. I managed to send an email from the domain server to another email account hosted elsewhere. But returning the email, or even sending a new email to the alias at my domain server doesn’t appear, the sender does not get a bounce or error.
What have I tried: I’ve sent an email from my alias at my domain to the same address (example me@mydomain.co.uk sent to me@mydomain.co.uk) and that sent but never returned.
I’ve done an on-line dns and mx scan to make sure that the server is resolving to the correct setting. It seems to
I’ve altered the host file in /etc/hosts so that it reflects my isp static ip I’m using. It now looks like this:
127.0.0.1 localhost.localdomain localhost
xx.xx.xx.xx mydomain.co.uk mydomain

(I’m actually using a real ip address not xx )
I used telnet mydomain.co.uk 25 and got a response so port 25 is open and can see my server.

I’m running Ubuntu 16.04.3 LTS and Virtualmin version 6.00 gpl usermin version 1.720 and webmin version 1.852


As I can't upload the file, here's a snippet of the mail log file in the hope that this is useful:
Sep 28 13:24:33 recom postfix/smtpd[18058]: warning: unknown[80.82.78.61]: SASL LOGIN authentication failed: authentication failure
Sep 28 13:24:33 recom postfix/smtpd[18058]: disconnect from unknown[80.82.78.61] ehlo=1 auth=0/1 rset=1 quit=1 commands=3/4
Sep 28 13:27:08 recom postfix/smtpd[29640]: warning: hostname 82-76-210-60.rdsnet.ro does not resolve to address 82.76.210.60: Name $
Sep 28 13:27:08 recom postfix/smtpd[29640]: connect from unknown[82.76.210.60]
Sep 28 13:27:11 recom postfix/smtpd[29640]: warning: unknown[82.76.210.60]: SASL LOGIN authentication failed: authentication failure
Sep 28 13:27:11 recom postfix/smtpd[29640]: disconnect from unknown[82.76.210.60] helo=1 auth=0/1 quit=1 commands=2/3
Sep 28 13:27:14 recom postfix/smtpd[29640]: connect from unknown[80.82.78.61]
Sep 28 13:27:17 recom postfix/smtpd[29640]: warning: unknown[80.82.78.61]: SASL LOGIN authentication failed: authentication failure
Sep 28 13:27:17 recom postfix/smtpd[29640]: disconnect from unknown[80.82.78.61] ehlo=1 auth=0/1 rset=1 quit=1 commands=3/4
Sep 28 13:29:42 recom postfix/smtpd[32050]: connect from unknown[213.157.55.82]
Sep 28 13:29:45 recom postfix/smtpd[32050]: warning: unknown[213.157.55.82]: SASL LOGIN authentication failed: authentication failure
Sep 28 13:29:45 recom postfix/smtpd[32050]: disconnect from unknown[213.157.55.82] helo=1 auth=0/1 quit=1 commands=2/3
Sep 28 13:29:59 recom postfix/smtpd[32050]: connect from unknown[80.82.78.61]
Sep 28 13:30:01 recom postfix/smtpd[32050]: warning: unknown[80.82.78.61]: SASL LOGIN authentication failed: authentication failure
Sep 28 13:30:01 recom postfix/smtpd[32050]: disconnect from unknown[80.82.78.61] ehlo=1 auth=0/1 rset=1 quit=1 commands=3/4
Sep 28 13:31:32 recom postfix/anvil[2006]: statistics: max connection rate 1/60s for (smtp:95.97.101.138) at Sep 28 13:21:42
Sep 28 13:31:32 recom postfix/anvil[2006]: statistics: max connection count 1 for (smtp:95.97.101.138) at Sep 28 13:21:42
Sep 28 13:31:32 recom postfix/anvil[2006]: statistics: max cache size 2 at Sep 28 13:21:46
Sep 28 13:32:12 recom postfix/smtpd[9802]: connect from unknown[82.113.59.26]
Sep 28 13:32:15 recom postfix/smtpd[9802]: warning: unknown[82.113.59.26]: SASL LOGIN authentication failed: authentication failure
Sep 28 13:32:15 recom postfix/smtpd[9802]: disconnect from unknown[82.113.59.26] helo=1 auth=0/1 quit=1 commands=2/3
Sep 28 13:32:42 recom postfix/smtpd[9802]: connect from unknown[80.82.78.61]
Sep 28 13:32:44 recom postfix/smtpd[9802]: warning: unknown[80.82.78.61]: SASL LOGIN authentication failed: authentication failure
Sep 28 13:32:44 recom postfix/smtpd[9802]: disconnect from unknown[80.82.78.61] ehlo=1 auth=0/1 rset=1 quit=1 commands=3/4
Sep 28 13:35:55 recom dovecot: master: Dovecot v2.2.22 (fe789d2) starting up for imap, pop3, pop3 (core dumps disabled)
Sep 28 13:35:59 recom postgrey[1814]: Process Backgrounded
Sep 28 13:35:59 recom postgrey[1814]: 2017/09/28-13:35:59 postgrey (type Net::Server::Multiplex) starting! pid(1814)
Sep 28 13:35:59 recom postgrey[1814]: Resolved [localhost]:10023 to [::1]:10023, IPv6
Sep 28 13:35:59 recom postgrey[1814]: Resolved [localhost]:10023 to [127.0.0.1]:10023, IPv4
Sep 28 13:36:00 recom postgrey[1814]: Binding to TCP port 10023 on host ::1 with IPv6
Sep 28 13:36:00 recom postgrey[1814]: Binding to TCP port 10023 on host 127.0.0.1 with IPv4
Sep 28 13:36:00 recom postgrey[1814]: Setting gid to "125 125"
Sep 28 13:36:00 recom postgrey[1814]: Setting uid to "116"
Sep 28 13:36:19 recom postfix[2118]: Postfix is running with backwards-compatible default settings
Sep 28 13:36:19 recom postfix[2118]: See http://www.postfix.org/COMPATIBILITY_README.html for details
Sep 28 13:36:19 recom postfix[2118]: To disable backwards compatibility use "postconf compatibility_level=2" and "postfix reload"
Sep 28 13:36:20 recom postfix/master[2162]: daemon started -- version 3.1.0, configuration /etc/postfix
Sep 28 13:37:27 recom postfix/smtpd[2564]: connect from unknown[92.240.252.85]
Sep 28 13:37:29 recom postfix/smtpd[2564]: warning: unknown[92.240.252.85]: SASL LOGIN authentication failed: authentication failure
Sep 28 13:37:29 recom postfix/smtpd[2564]: disconnect from unknown[92.240.252.85] helo=1 auth=0/1 quit=1 commands=2/3
Sep 28 13:38:12 recom postfix/smtpd[2564]: connect from unknown[80.82.78.61]
Sep 28 13:38:14 recom postfix/smtpd[2564]: warning: unknown[80.82.78.61]: SASL LOGIN authentication failed: authentication failure
Sep 28 13:38:14 recom postfix/smtpd[2564]: disconnect from unknown[80.82.78.61] ehlo=1 auth=0/1 rset=1 quit=1 commands=3/4
Sep 28 13:40:10 recom postfix/smtpd[3672]: connect from unknown[41.180.72.44]
Sep 28 13:40:13 recom postfix/smtpd[3672]: warning: unknown[41.180.72.44]: SASL LOGIN authentication failed: authentication failure
Sep 28 13:40:13 recom postfix/smtpd[3672]: disconnect from unknown[41.180.72.44] helo=1 auth=0/1 quit=1 commands=2/3

Halfhidden · September 28, 2017, 1:01pm

Quick update. After some while the email I sent to myself did in fact turn up in the inbox. Here’s the header from that.


From:	"Website hosting company" 
Subject:	test
To:	tracey@recom.co.uk
Message-Id:	<1506600223.3176@recom.co.uk>
Date:	Thu, 28 Sep 2017 13:03:43 +0100 (BST)
MIME-Version:	1.0
Content-Type:	multipart/mixed; boundary="bound1506600223"

Joe · September 29, 2017, 4:55am

You have postgrey enabled (which is good for preventing spam). The first time any sender sends you mail, it will be delayed by as much as 60 minutes (usually more like 10-20 minutes). Subsequent emails will be delivered, as long as the sending server adheres to the standards and resends on a soft failure.

Halfhidden · October 3, 2017, 9:03pm

Hi Joe,
Thanks for the reply.
Since reading your reply I realised that I must have done something wrong that probably wasn’t in the scope of this support, and I’m concious that I’m new to virtualmin and webmin so I din’t want to use anyone’s time up on a subject because I was either too lazy or unable to read the setup instructions. But I’ve been busy looking at posted problems and trying to see a solution for me over the past couple of days.
But that said I have done my best to sort things out and still I’m unable to receive emails to any of my hosted domains.
So far I’ve completely re written the zone for my domain dns and all bar a few advisories… it passed the mxreports. I’ve setup my PTR to match my hostname (I think). But I’m sure I’ve made a mistake somewhere. Emails sent from webmin or virtualmin are received, but returned emails aren’t.
Is this a dns mistake I’ve made?