[Klug-general] Email fiddling

[Kevin Groves]

Michael E. Rentell wrote:

> G'day all,
>
> I wonder if I'm the oldest member of the group. Maybe this query will
> prove creeping idiocy but nothing ventured nothing gained.
>
:-) I'm feeling very old today... Brain not working after a few hours 
development time but here goes...

> To while away my retirement and to avoid the frozen garden I thought I
> would attempt to get email using the hostname allocated to me by
> ntlworld.com (yeah I know, no php, no cgi-bin but it is fast and
> reliablish).


Fair enough.

>
> When I switch on my desktop PC under Mandrake 10.1 the default hostname
> I see on the command line is mick at pc1-folk1-3-0-cust113.ntlworld.com
>
I would say that address is just one provided by DHCP so email shouldnt 
really go there. It should be more like 'mick at ntlworld.com' or 
something. Check with them what your proper mail box should be.

> That intrigued me so from my standard email setup (this one) I sent
> myself an email using that address. It certainly popped off OK and
> hasn't bounced but I don't know where it has gone. Possibly ntl have
> directed it to the null box. It hasn't come back down the POP3 
> connection.

That would possibly be due to above.

>
> Now to the question. Does anyone know if it be possible to set up
> fetchmail to find that email? I've loaded fetchmail and fetchmailconf
> and set up just that hostname and user mick but when I activate it as
> root I am informed that fetchmail can't find its cannonical DNS name.
>
Not a problem fetchmail I've used it for years but the problem you might 
have is possibly due to everything above. Also I'm a little concerned 
how you are connected to your ISP. If the host name is changed to 
something.ntlworld.com are you using DHCP and letting it change your 
host name?

> Is that it? Idea dead? It was just something to keep me sane these
> chilly days. I've learned to hack Linux over the past 4 years simply by
> playing like this. All part of life's rich experiences.
>
Good to hear it. It's what we all like to do.


BTW everyone, I'm mobile again!



Kev,