DISQUS

Bren · 3 years ago

For a Mac newbie, your kung-fu is strong.

BrianSchu · 3 years ago

Thanks for the tip. I followed the instructions above on my MacBook, but no luck. When I use the server setting I get an error message in Mail, "Cannot send message usingthe server 127.0.0.1"
Hmmmm.....

MRZ · 3 years ago

Does "MAILSERVER" have to be -YES- or -NO-?

You write that if the line exists in /etc/hostconfig you have to change it to -NO-, but if it does not exist you have to add it with -YES-.

That seems strange to me.

Brandon Eley · 3 years ago

That's cool - does it go out on port 25? Most ISP's that want you to use their outgoing servers block port 25. Would having your mac act as a server get around that?

I'm going to give this a try and see - I work from 3 different locations, all of which restrict SMTP mail to their own servers.

Thanks for the tip!

danny · 3 years ago

this won't work if your ISP 'like here in belgium' block port 25 for everything besides their own smtp hosts.

Juan Magdaraog · 3 years ago

thanks for the good tip. have you tried setting up a gmail account and using gmail's smtp to send emails?

Rom · 3 years ago

Well, the thing is - some ISPs block port 25 preventing you from sending email. It might be a good idea to use a different port to send. :)

Christian · 3 years ago

This is one of those "why didn't I think of this" ideas. After messing around with smtp server authentication and TLS, your solution is so much simpeler! Great idea! However, when sending from certain IP addresses, the mail could be caught in spamtraps if the reverse address mappings or the FQDN with which the smtp server anounces itself are not right.

Joel Bradshaw · 3 years ago

Re: Blocked port 25.
Use a tunneling program, like putty (which is windows)
'Google' for ssh tunnel thunderbird
This should get you info on how to do it.
Google for open ssh macintosh and you should find a mac program which works like putty. (no flames please, windows at work, mac at home) where I don't need ssh...

McGu · 3 years ago

Hey guys, there are numerous articles on apples website under the support tab. Basically, if you just go to the server settings and under the Outgoing Mail Server (SMTP) change it to port 587, it should work no matter where you are. I travel frequently and have yet to experience problems. I woudl frequently encounter problems sending my mail if I used the standard port 25, but since I changed it nearly 2 years ago, it works flawlessly.

Aaron Brazell · 3 years ago

Bren: I'm a Unix guy, remember. ;-)

Brian: firewall blocking port 25?

MRZ: the bottom line is you need the line MAILSERVER=-YES- in the file. If the MAILSERVER line exists, great Make sure it is set to -YES-. If it doesn't exist, add it.

Brandon, Rom, McGu: You can configure it to go out on port 587, but that is not in this how-to.

Brandon Eley · 3 years ago

I've got everything configured, including port 587 and am still not able to send.

Also, there may be some issues sending email from your own SMTP server, like recipient's mail server thinking you're sending SPAM.

I'll keep tinkering with it, but I think it might be easier just to set my web server to a different port.

Omar · 3 years ago

You can configure SMTP with authentication in your mail server(most ISP´s have it). That also works.

Omar

g · 3 years ago

The far easier solution -- for Mac and Windows -- is to set up a Gmail account and use their SMTP server. Since their SMTP server requires authentication, I think they even allow relay.

Brent · 3 years ago

First you need to download postfix. Extract it to the Desktop.

That's a postfix startup script. Postfix is already installed on your mac, and instead of having it run 24/7, you could just fire it up when needed by running:

sudo postfix start

in a Terminal.

Mac · 3 years ago

Thanks for the Article. It is definitely help full. Technically with any blog installation your local webserver you should be able to do that as well.

www.mostofmymac.com
to help you get the most out of your mac...

David · 3 years ago

An even easier solution - and a great way to setup a secure, alternate port so you can SMTP anywhere...

http://www.cutedgesystems.com/software/PostfixE...

Zach · 3 years ago

This has to be the stupidest way to "send mail from everywhere" I've ever seen.

Basically every email provider worth going with has port 587 open. They also have TLS and SMTP auth enabled.

Turning these on in Mail.app and Thunderbird are simple. Last time I had to setup Mail.app these settings were turned on by default, even. I think Mail.app checks to see if they're supported now.

The advantages of doing this? You don't have to worry about port 25 blocks. Your mail always comes from the same source, so you don't have to worry about being on IP space that's been blacklisted.

The disadvantages? You can't say you run your own mail server. I really can't think of any more.

As time goes on, you'll only have adjust this more, or wait to send mail until you get to a location it actually works from. Better to use the proper SMTP server via port 587 and be done with it.

Aaron Brazell · 3 years ago

Actually, Zach, it's not the "stupidest way". In fact I control my own servers and I have TLS auth required. If you actually comprehended what I said, you'd notice I said I used Entourage. And if you know Entourage, there is no TLS support built in. There's also no TLS included in Outlook 2003 either but at least Outlook gracefully falls back on SSL where Entourage doesn't.

So yeah, it might not be the best way but I had very legit reasons for doing it this way.

lvlolvlo · 3 years ago

Why not just use port 587 and not worry about failing an SPF or other ms (=! m$) check so your e-mail reaches the intended party.

Plus not to mention if you send e-mail to certain ISPs they do not allow mail from dynamic hosts (which I assume most of you will be using because you don't have a static ms setup)

Larry · 3 years ago

I predict that anyone foolish enough to try this will be rewarded by losing random email from ISP's that block SMTP from dynamic IP addresses.

Earl Stutes · 3 years ago

I have one correction to make to the fine article. The command

sudo chown -R 0:0 Postfix

should be

sudo chown -R 27:29 Postfix.

I believe. Postfix already has passwd/group entrys and for security reasons, should not be the ROOT user.

=eas=

Zach · 3 years ago

Entourage does support StartTLS and it does support outgoing on port 587. However, it doesn't support both at the same time, which is fairly stupid. I was not aware of this until I did a quick google search to confirm.

What you have to do for Entourage is use port 465 and SSL. I don't know how widely it's supported, however I'd assume that it's supported by all mail providers that support 587 with StartTLS, considering the problem also affects Outlook, which most users use.

I found a page on yale.edu that does a good job of showing how to configure this.

http://www.yale.edu/its/email/howdoi/authentica...

I still stand by statement that running postfix on your local machine is a stupid idea. There are too many problems associated with sending directly from wherever you happen to be for this to be considered anything but a last-ditch solution.

If you run Postfix on your own mail server, you can easily enable port 465 (aka smtps) in /etc/postfix/master.cf. Set the args to "-o smtpd_tls_wrappermode=yes -o smtpd_sasl_auth_enable=yes" and you've effectively duplicated the setup for port 587.

Aaron Brazell · 3 years ago

Yeah Zach... tries that. Doesn't seem to work. We're moving to a new server cluster and I'm thinking when that is done, I need to make some other options available for mail.

Sean · 3 years ago

If you are just looking to be able to send email from any internet connection with your regular Mac email client, here is an approach I posted about that works well for me:
http://longtailend.com/index.php/2006/08/31/smt...

David Lopan · 2 years ago

Try this instead.
http://cutedgesystems.com/software/PostfixEnabler/
it's cheap and it works.