G    sendmail Error Messages

This appendix provides an explanation and suggested user actions for the sendmail error messages. These messages can occur when sending mail to another user on the same host or when sending mail using TCP/IP. If other mailers are configured on your system (for example, DECnet), see the documentation that accompanies the mailer for additional messages.

The following sendmail messages are found either in a rejected message or in the syslogd message file:

binmail: opening /usr/spool/mail/filename-: Permission denied
Explanation: The /bin/mail program could not deliver the mail on the destination host. Possible reasons are as follows:

  • The /usr/spool/mail directory permissions are incorrect. The correct permissions are 1777.

  • The mailbox permissions are incorrect. The correct permissions are 600.

  • The mailbox owner is incorrect.

Cannot send message for 3 days
Explanation: The message was not delivered during the period specified by the retry parameter in the /var/adm/sendmail/sendmail.cf file. It is being returned to the sender. Possible reasons are as follows:

  • The destination host does not exist.

  • The mail was addressed to a host outside of your company and no relay host has been configured in the /var/adm/sendmail/sendmail.cf file.

  • The host has been off line or the network connection has been unreliable for three days.

User Action:

  1. Verify all address information.

  2. If the mail was addressed to a host outside of your company, you might not be able to send the mail directly. Check your sendmail configuration by entering the following command:

    #  grep '^define(_GateINET' /var/adm/sendmail/hostname.m4

    If the braces are empty (that is, do not contain a host name), reconfigure sendmail and specify a relay host. See Section 11.3 for more information on specifying a relay name.

  3. Send the message again. The message is queued and sent automatically when the host is reachable.

Connection refused
Explanation: The sendmail daemon is not running on the destination host.

User Action: Check whether sendmail is running on the host by using the ps command as follows:

#  ps -ax | grep send

If it is not, ask the system administrator to start sendmail.

Connection timed out during user open
Explanation: A problem occurred during the SMTP session between 2 hosts, causing a time out.

User Action: The message will be retried later.

Host unknown
Explanation: Possible reasons are as follows:

  • An address record for the host was not found.

  • The /var/adm/sendmail/sendmail.cf file does not define a relay host that can handle mail addresses outside of your company.

User Action:

  1. If BIND is not configured on your host, verify that the host's address is defined. Check the /etc/hosts file if you are resolving addresses locally or issue the ypmatch hostname hosts command if you are using NIS. The hosts entry in the svc.conf file defines the services used.

    If the host is not defined, ask your system administrator to correct the problem.

  2. Check for MX records for the host by using the nslookup command as follows:

    #  nslookup -q=mx hostname

    If a record exists, go to step 3.

  3. Check for address records by using the nslookup command. If the address is not found, have the BIND domain administrator for the destination domain add an address (A) record for the host in the destination domain.

  4. If the mail was addressed to a host outside of your company, you might not be able to send the mail directly. Check your sendmail configuration by entering the following command:

    #  grep '^define(GateINET' /var/adm/sendmail/hostname.m4

    If the braces are empty (that is, do not contain a host name), reconfigure sendmail and specify a relay host. Send the message again. See Section 11.3 for more information on specifying a relay name.

I refuse to talk to myself
Explanation: The local host was asked to connect to itself and deliver a message.

User Action: Check your sendmail configuration by entering the following command:

#  grep '^define(GateINET' /var/adm/sendmail/hostname.m4

If the braces on any line contain your host's name, there is a configuration error. Reconfigure sendmail. See Section 11.3 for more information.

Remote protocol error
Explanation: This message is generally found in the mail.log file generated by the syslogd daemon and indicates a problem in communicating with the remote host.

User Action: The message will be retried later.

Service unavailable
This is a secondary error message. Some other error has occurred that caused sendmail to interpret an address as an action.

User Action: Look for other error messages, for example Host unknown, and resolve them first. Resolving other errors should resolve this error as well.

User unknown/Addressee unknown
Explanation: The message reached the final destination, but the user address was not found in the local aliases file or the local password file at the final destination.

User Action: Check whether the user address is correct or whether the user has moved.