Email Address Not Found - OS X Lion Email Server

[gopherhockey]

I set up Lion Server and configured it to be an email server. Pretty straight forward. I configured its domain, then created a user with an email account.

I can test connectivity to the server and all is well. I can send from the server as a logged in user. What I cannot do is receive email... if I try send an email to the server (either locally via telnet to port 25 or externally) I get:

Generating server: california.mydomain.com

address@mydomain.com
#< #5.1.1 x-unix; user unknown> #SMTP#

The email server appears to be able to receive the message, but is not able to associate a user and the email address I have configured for said user.

Its like I'm missing some part of the directory that tells the mail server who is who, but everything is so straight forward and simple I can't see what is missing.

(I have run Exchange in the past, 10+ years experience running corporate email servers... this seems too simple by comparison)

 

[throttlemeister]

I had the same problem, and fixed it. I posted it elsewhere, but I will repost here:

Got it fixed!

1) I did not have a directory server installed - I only 2 macs, so why bother? Well, as it turns out, even though it is an option during setup to not use a directory server, it doesn't seem to particularly like doing things local. At least when it comes to mail server. The mail server doesn't pick up local users other than the initially created administrator. Properly setting up a local master ldap made life a lot easier. I just added the users using the workgroup manager, added the workgroup group and adding the email address to the short names made everything working honky dory. That last step is really important.

2) Connection issues were caused by a screwed up DNS config. After the reinstall, the DNS was properly setup again and after setting the local DNS as primary in the DHCP server on my router, everything works both locally and remote.

I still think OSX Server is very un- like. Most tools needed and described in the OSX Server manual are not present until downloaded from some obscure kb article, it requires manual hacking config files through Terminal to get virtual hosts working and settings are all over the place. They make it look really simple, but unlike regular OSX which anybody can use, Server does require knowledge of servers, so at least you know where to look to fix things. They make things look easy with the Server.app, but I doubt Average Joe will be able to set this up for anything other than a 100% internal home server without real domain and incoming connections from the internet.

Hope this helps.

 

[throttlemeister]

To make it simpler: did you add <user>@domain to the short names of <user> in Workgroup Manager? If not, doing so will likely make it work.

 

[gopherhockey]

I had the same problem, and fixed it. I posted it elsewhere, but I will repost here:

When I look at the short names, its greyed out... I cannot modify this setting even though I'm in as the diradmin.

What exactly do you mean when you say you added the email addresses to the short names?

Note: my directory shows /LDAPv3/127.0.0.1 Not sure if thats correct...?

 

[gopherhockey]

I'm on my 3rd re-install of the entire OS & Server. I think you are right in that this is not very Apple-like. At least from a Microsoft server expert, this seems very lacking in tools and is not at all as simple as it looks (in fact by making it too simple I think they made it harder)

To start over, I'm curious... past video's I've seen on configuring open directory say to set dns a certain way. I have DNS running on another server, so I'm not setting it up locally.

However, by default my machine is a .local address. Should I be changing this before I install open directory?

I'm concerned that it should be my domain.com and that the .local stuff is causing some issues.

I guess I'll have to be a bit more patient until walk-throughs start showing up on how to set up open directory and email from scratch on a Lion server.

 

[throttlemeister]

I'm on my 3rd re-install of the entire OS & Server. I think you are right in that this is not very Apple-like. At least from a Microsoft server expert, this seems very lacking in tools and is not at all as simple as it looks (in fact by making it too simple I think they made it harder)

To start over, I'm curious... past video's I've seen on configuring open directory say to set dns a certain way. I have DNS running on another server, so I'm not setting it up locally.

However, by default my machine is a .local address. Should I be changing this before I install open directory?

I'm concerned that it should be my domain.com and that the .local stuff is causing some issues.

I guess I'll have to be a bit more patient until walk-throughs start showing up on how to set up open directory and email from scratch on a Lion server.

Yes. My domain's DNS is on the internet, but I still let it create DNS for it. What it does basically, is creating a local zone for your domain with just the machine in it. DNS creation is done in the background, just feed the domain during setup and don't mess with it. Local services seem to depend on this.

My LDAP is the same as yours btw.

 

[gopherhockey]

Odd. I created a user with short name "john"

I then created a second short name: john.lastname@domain.com

Cannot get that to work for the life of me.

Finally today created a 3rd short name: john@domain.com

This works fine.

Now I get that short names are what control the smtp delivery, but you can't just add smtp addresses in there. To get this to work, I added just "john.lastname" as a short name, and now all is good.

This isn't intuitive at all.