I owe some of you an apology. Now, I know we're all techno-whatevers in one form or another, and I know that at least 99.9% of you understand that lists are automated things which often develop minds and personalities of their own, however...
If you'll just indulge me, as while I'm still somewhat abashed by what has transpired, I'm actually quite proud of myself that my good friend Steven (Read-the-Logs-and-the-Process-Dumps) Levine spurred me into looking in the right place, I just have to share this with all of you (feel free to skip the next few paragraphs and get to the closing one, if DNS, spam filters, and mail servers don't make your teapot whistle; I won't mind...really, I won't).
As everyone on the list is aware, I migrated over to CommuniGate Pro (CGP) last month, in search of a more stable and robust platform for handling mail and lists here (and of course, wanted something which ran on OS/.2, for obvious reasons). CGP is really quite flexible and easy to configure, once you get over the initial feeling of being overwhelmed by all the web-based admin screens.
Anyway, since migrating the server over, installing the Astaro/Novell Security Manager firewall, and moving off of the cable link to dual DSL connections, things have been relatively stable around here (for a change). However, I have been seeing an issue where the primary DSL connection goes down more frequently than I can either believe or than would be tolerable. When that happens, Security Manager detects the dead link and rolls over to the backup line. Between Direct Update which runs on the lone W2K Citrix server here (yes, don't even get me started) and inadyn (thanks go out to Alex Samorukov, samm [at] os2.kiev.ua for the OS/2 port), which runs on the mail server, DynDNS is notified of the change in public address for all of the hosted domains, and things continue to run rather smoothly. When the primary comes back up, the process repeats itself (though in reverse). Everything is right with the world (well, at least in that little corner of it where my data cabinet resides).
Many - if not most - of you are familiar with some of the more basic methods of spam reduction, chiefest among those being reverse DNS lookups. This is simply a DNS lookup which is done to see if the host sending a message actually has the IP address which is reported as matching the name by which it identifies itself. Fairly standard stuff, and these days, this level of functionality is almost a requirement to keep from getting inundated with junk. Well, wouldn't you know, as luck would have it, at around 5:19pm EDT, we were in the process of echoing a post to the list when the primary link went down. I think messages had been sent to a good number of the members already, but five of you on Earthlink came dribbling back as rejected. My best guess is that we failed the reverse DNS lookup for that moment while the DNS changes were still rolling out.
CGP is configured out of the box to promptly unsubscribe an address in case of a fatal bounce. Well, what piqued my interest was the five Earthlink addresses which came tumbling into my Inbox as list admin, telling me that all five - on Earthlink, and only on Earthlink - had been unsubscribed.
Suffice it to say, that while exchanging notes with Steve, I took a close look at the server logs and found the problem. I've since relaxed CGP's settings somewhat, to allow for 20 non-fatal bounces (mailbox full, DNS lookup errors, etc.), and to treat a fatal bounce as three non-fatal ones. That should give us a bit more leeway with these things in the future (at least while I figure out what's up with this DSL connection).
I have re-subscribed everyone who was automatically unsubscribed, going back to the initial date of the rollover to CGP (March 29 was the date of the first "unsubscribed" notification), so we'll see where we go from here. There are a couple mail servers which are still giving me some trouble (Michel, I hope you can get the web archives of this, as I can't even get regular email to your domain, in spite of conversing - in my best French - with your domain admin). If any of you hear from anyone who seems to be having trouble getting messages, please ask him (or her) to email me privately so that I may investigate.
I'll also try to get back into the swing of some regular activity around here. I know I still haven't quite picked up my usual pace, in spite of tax season i the US having reached a rather anticlimactic end a couple weeks ago. If you haven't yet seen the new Warpstock website running on Geeklog, please do, and feel free to post copious comments. That's really where I've been spending my time of late, as we gear up for Warpstock X in Windsor, Ontario.
Thanks for letting me beat my chest a little. ;-)
--
Lewis
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Lewis G Rosenthal, CNA, CLP, CLE
Rosenthal & Rosenthal, LLC
Accountants / Network Consultants
New York / Northern Virginia www.2rosenthals.com
eComStation Consultants www.ecomstation.com
Novell Users International www.novell.com/linux/truth
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