Bug 146500

Summary: send-pr fails
Product: Documentation Reporter: Friedrich Volkmann <bsd>
Component: Books & ArticlesAssignee: Glen Barber <gjb>
Status: Closed FIXED    
Severity: Affects Only Me    
Priority: Normal    
Version: Latest   
Hardware: Any   
OS: Any   

Description Friedrich Volkmann 2010-05-11 17:10:05 UTC 
send-pr uses the local MTA to send the message to FreeBSD-gnats-submit@freebsd.org. When that MTA is trying to send the mail, it identifies as HELO somedomain, where somedomain is usually an only locally valid domain or host name. This makes mx1.freebsd.org reject the mail with the error:
450 Helo command rejected: Host not found

The same check is applied to the envelop sender address which is usually something like root@myhost. This leads to the error message:
450 Sender address rejected: Domain not found

An SMTP status code 4xx makes the sender MTA retry and retry, while the user does not even notice that the PR did not go through.

Fix: 

a) make mx1.freebsd.org accept invalid domains, or
b) mention the problem in a BUGS or PROBLEMS section of the send-pr man page, maybe refering to the web interface as a less error prone way to submit PRs.
How-To-Repeat: Send a PR from a PC whose IP has no DNS entry.
Comment 1 Johann Kois freebsd_committer freebsd_triage 2010-06-09 16:10:02 UTC 
Responsible Changed
From-To: freebsd-www->postmaster

Change responsibility.  As this is a "problem" of how the mailserver on FreeBSD.org handles incoming send-pr mails.
Comment 2 sahil+freebsd-postmaster 2012-02-20 15:48:51 UTC 
The issues described in this PR are not bugs, but rather features.  We
cannot configure mx1 to accept invalid domains.  The send-pr(1) man page
contains instructions on how to set a valid envelope sender address, so
that is also not a problem that requires "fixing".  I suggest this PR be
closed.  As this PR is assigned to postmaster@, I will close it if there
is no further feedback for two weeks.

-- 
Sahil Tandon
Comment 3 Glen Barber freebsd_committer freebsd_triage 2012-02-21 02:15:31 UTC 
State Changed
From-To: open->closed

Closed on behalf of postmaster.
Comment 4 Glen Barber freebsd_committer freebsd_triage 2012-02-21 02:15:31 UTC 
Responsible Changed
From-To: postmaster->gjb

Over to me. 

The FreeBSD.org mail servers should not be configured to allow 
mail from nonexistent domains (as mentioned by Sahil). 

Please consider using the mail/ssmtp port and using your ISPs 
SMTP server for send-pr(1) submissions.