sending mail on lan...

[Jerry LeVan]

On Aug 1, 2007, at 5:48 PM, Milo Velimirovic wrote:

>
> On Aug 1, 2007, at 4:38 PM, Jerry LeVan wrote:
>
>>
>> On Aug 1, 2007, at 5:28 PM, Dan Shoop wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> On Aug 1, 2007, at 4:55 PM, Jerry LeVan wrote:
>>>
>>>> Grrr,
>>>>
>>>> I can send mail all over the internet but I can't send
>>>> mail to the machines on the local lan :(
>>>
>>> You don't send mail to machines on the lan you send mail to the  
>>> server where those machines pick up their mail. That is most lan  
>>> machines aren't MTAs and MDAs.
>>>
>>> -dhan
>>
>> That sounds wonky...I am running postfix on both machines...there  
>> has to
>> be some way to send mail directly from one machine to the other...
>>
>> Once upon a time, many years ago we had a bunch of AT&T machines  
>> and I
>> was able to send mail by specifying an actual ip address. "Mail" does
>> not seem to like that ;(
>
> Dan S. is describing the normal practice of what one does these  
> days. Typically you have one copmuter designated as a mail server.  
> It runs Postfix as an MTA/MDA and you set up your client computers  
> to talk to it...
>
> to do what you wnat to do (I think) you need to have both computers  
> know each other's names and IPs in the hosts file (or in their  
> netinfo machines directory if you haven't enabled Flat files in  
> Directory ACcess)
>
> In the Postfix config files you tell it what domains it accepts  
> mail for, that is, whatever constitutes a valid Right-Hand-Side of  
> an e-mail address.
>
> After that it should just work.
>
> I remember the bad old days of doing what you're describing with  
> Sendmail on NeXTs... much munching of sendmail config files... ick.
>
>  - Milo
>
Well I told postfix that localdomain was ok and entered the info  
into /etc/hosts

A fragment:
192.168.1.40    laser
192.168.1.50    vpc
192.168.1.60    jerrypc
192.168.1.70    linuxbox
192.168.1.80    mpb.localdomain mpb
192.168.1.90    server.localdomain server
::1             localhost

when I send mail to jerry at server.localdomain the mail log shows..
Aug  1 18:23:02 mbp postfix/qmgr[3388]: C20E5145C25:  
from=<jerry at localhost.localdomain>, size=548, nrcpt=1 (queue active)
Aug  1 18:23:02 mbp postfix/smtp[3461]: C20E5145C25:  
to=<jerry at server.localdomain>, orig_to=<jerry at server>, relay=none,  
delay=0, status=bounced (Host or domain name not found. Name service  
error for name=server.localdomain type=A: Host not found)

It looks like postfix is not using the hosts file.

Is there any way to tell it to try hosts first then other thingees?

Jerry