Subj : SMTP auth woes.
To   : All
From : Ibanez
Date : Tue May 31 2005 11:06 pm

Hey all,

I need a little help with the sychronet mail server - specifically in relation
to relaying through an smtp server (my ISPs in this case) that uses SMTPAUTH.

Now, configuring my mail client was never a problem. I put in my user & pass
and Thunderbird sends outgoing mail with no probs. However, getting the BBS to
send mail has not worked since I switched to Earthlink, because I couldn't
figure out what the problem was. That and I didn't have time to investigate.

So, today I ran ethereal while running thunderbird to see the conversation
between my mail client and the smtp server to see how it works correctly. Then,
I ran ethereal while sending a "netmail" from my account on my BBS to another
email address I have. Very different results in the capture log!

First, the error message I was getting from Earthlink's server:

503 AUTH command used when not advertised.

OK well I was scratching my head since I didn't know what was going on behind
the scenes. What I learned after using ethereal was very interesting.
Thunderbird greets Earthlink's SMTP server with EHLO, while synchronet's mail
server sends HELO. Earthlink's mail server does NOT advertise the AUTH command
when you send a HELO (confirmed by telnetting to port 25 on Earthlink's server
and trying it by hand). When you send EHLO, it DOES advertise the AUTH command.

What gives? I don't know what difference EHLO vs HELO makes. I'm not an SMTP
guru. I can tell you that Earthlink is using Exim ESMTP mail server if that
helps.

Anyhow, is there a way to get synchronet's mail server to send EHLO instead?
Then it wouldn't be a problem when it sends the AUTH CRAM-MD5 command since it
will have been advertised.

Again, I don't know a great deal about the inner workings of SMTP so be gentle.
 ;)


- Ibanez

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