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smtp forwarding to exchange and lotus

Hello all,
I need some expert advice. I have two email servers at our site. One is Exchange 2003 @xyz.org and the other Lotus Domino @abc.com. I want to forward port 25 to one machine. What I would like to do is install some flavor of Linux on a third machine and use Postfix or sendmail to just forward all email to the appropriate server. The mail does not have to go out through this server just incoming. Here are my questions.

1. What version of Linux(command line only please)? I fluent with Red Hat.
2. What mail server Sendmail, Postfix, Qmail?
3. What file to edit to forward mail to the appropriate server?
4. Is there anything special I need to do to forward mail to the Exchange server?
5. Did I miss anything? Am I crazy? What day is this?

Thanks,

Brad

Brent

1. slackware, if you want command line, thats one of the oldest and most compatible ones. I use it right now to filter spam. Don't get me wrong, this doesnt mean you cant install this on redhat, infact if your more versed with redhat, i would say, deploy it with redhat. I had redhat with postfix and spamassassin at one time, so i know it works.
2. Postfix, easy to setup, especially if you are just forwarding and very secure as well as very stable.
3. Postfix has a trasport.map file that you will need to edit and then run a "postmap transport.map"
domain.com smtp:[ip.of.the.server]:25
in the file. Also, if you have multiple domains, you will need to add them under that line, pretty straight forward.
4. once you have that file setup, there is nothing more to foward the mail to your server.
5. Maybe the way to setup postfix: http://www.postfix.org

If you get slackware, there is a website that has packages for it that will setup everything for you so that all you have to do is setup the master.cf file with the basic params.

oh and its wednesday.. i think.. we work in it.. no idea.. people want everything yesterday, so i tend to live in the past. :)

murgroup

ASKER

I heard from a friend that Slack is good. I will give it a try tomorrow and let you know how it goes. Any idea what that website is? Thanks for the input.

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Sembee

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Brent

www.slackware.org :)

Brent

That wouldnt be a bad idea sembee..

murgroup

ASKER

Well I like that smtp connector idea so I set it up in exchange. Unfortunately it did not work. It may be my dns setup on the sbs 2003 box. My understanding of exchange is that if I have an smtpc setup I don't need any internal dns entries. It should forward directly to the lotus server. Any ideas on what the problem might be?

Sembee

Can you define a bit more clearly what didn't work?

Take it step by step - test it from the server first using OWA and an admin account. Don't rush in to trying it from outside. With this technique it is easy to get something wrong - my notes were redrafted at least twice before I posted them on my website and may be reviewed again at shortly.

Simon.

murgroup

ASKER

I setup the smtpc according to your website instructions. I used the internal IP of the lotus server [192.168.0.8]. Used the exchange server as the bridgehead. Checked forward all email to this domain. Set the router to forward port 25 to exchange server. Setup DNS zone for xyz.com and created an A record of mail 192.168.0.8 and then an mx record that uses the A record. Should I have put the A record and mx record in my .local zone file? Then tried to send a mail from my external exchange server to an internal Lotus email account. It returned the email:

Your message did not reach some or all of the intended recipients.

Subject: test
Sent: 3/30/2005 2:13 PM

The following recipient(s) could not be reached:

tbyron@xyz.com.com on 3/30/2005 2:13 PM
The e-mail account does not exist at the organization this message was sent to. Check the e-mail address, or contact the recipient directly to find out the correct address.
<xyz.org #5.1.1>

Sembee

First - was this: "tbyron@xyz.com.com" a typo?

Was the bounce message generated from your server? It is difficult to tell as you have hidden the domain names.
Was this a message from your Exchange server to the Lotus Notes machine?

Simon.

murgroup

ASKER

Yes I have hidden the domain names. Call me paranoid. I sent a test message from an external mail server to the internal Exchange server I am trying to configure. The internal Exchange machine returned the message above to my external mail server. For some reason the Exchange server is not using the smtpc I created to forward email addressed to the Lotus domain. For clarification, I have one smtpc for the Exchange domain (xyz.org) and another smtpc for the Lotus domain (xyz.com). Sembee if anyone can help me figure this out it is you. Please help me drive through this problem.

Sembee

Hiding the domain names is fine... just make sure that it is clear which one is which.

Step back a bit.
What happens if you send a message from an account on Exchange to the Lotus system? Any NDR? Disapear in to the ether?

Simon.

murgroup

ASKER

I sent emails to two different Lotus users from my internal Exchange account and both returned the same error as above.

BTW - Sorry the double .coms above was a typo.

Sembee

The message above means what it says - the mailbox or address isn't recognised. This means that the server the email is being sent to doesn't recognise it.

Have you got Message Tracking enabled? This will show you where Exchange is delivering the message.

Simon.

murgroup

ASKER

Simon,
After resolving duplicate email address problems in exchange the smtpc now works. Thank you so much and you are the guru.

cheers,

Brad

Sembee

Excellent. Glad to hear you have it work and thanks for the points.

Simon.