MX record not found problem

[needhelpnow]

hi,

i am installing Zimbra 5.0.4 on RHEL ES 4. I am getting an error which says "DNS Error resolving MX for . It is suggested that domain name have an MX record configured in DNS. Change domain name?" I have the following questions about this error.
1) What does this error mean?
2) My host is not actually an email server yet so it may not already have an MX record configured in the primary DNS. How do I confirm what A and/or MX record s are configured at the DNS for this host? Is there any command that I can run on the host to query the DNS?
3) If I do not want to change the domain name at this time and just skip this step, will the installation eventually fail or will there be any problem later on? If yes, what kind of problems.
4) If i want to change the domain name, what should it be? should it be something other than the current domain name? how do I put correct value so that the error goes away?

Thanks

[phoenix]

hi,

i am installing Zimbra 5.0.4 on RHEL ES 4. I am getting an error which says "DNS Error resolving MX for . It is suggested that domain name have an MX record configured in DNS. Change domain name?" I have the following questions about this error.
1) What does this error mean?

The error means exactly what it says, you need valid DNS A& MX records and a valid /etc/hosts file for the installation and running of Zimbra.

You can check your server with the following (run on the zimbra server):

host `hostname`  <-- use backticks not single quotes
dig yourdomain.com mx
dig yourdomain.com any

and post the results.

Please read the documentation for system installation requirements.

[needhelpnow]

Thank you Bill for the reply.
I looked at some other threads and found the answers I was looking for.
Here's how it got solved.
- I changed the domain name from xyzsvr.abcdomain.com to abcdomain.com and it said none of the MX records are resolving to this abcdomain.com but there were other MX records like defsvr.abcdomain.com so it went ahead and installed it.
- later on, it said that mailbox and postfix services could not be started.
- upon checking the logs I discovered that there were port conflicts because sendmail and httpd services were running. so i stopped them and disabled them too.
- After that I ran zmcontrol start again and everything started up fine.
So far it looks good in admin console and i could send mails to/from the same zimbra server user accounts. However, I am having trouble sending mails to my gmail/yahoo accounts. What could be the reason for that? My zimbra server host is behind firewall.

[phoenix]

Do you have the "Enable DNS lookups" set in the server settings in the Admin UI. You really do need your DNS records to point to abcdomain.com (as you've called it above) and not to xyzsvr.abcdomain.com as you may find you need to make changes later - it's far better to get ypur DNS settings correct now.

Please post the details from the commands I asked you for earlier, also post the details of this file:

cat /etc/resolv.conf

Which operating system is this? Have you also disabled any SElinux and/or firewall on this server?

[carlsanders]

This was also my issues as well with FC7. I do my own DNS, so I knew
the settings were right.

Instead of doing host.domain.com, just do domain.com

The instructions should be changed.

[needhelpnow]

My OS is RHEL ES 4 and I am running Zimbra 5.0.4.
I do have "enable DNS lookups" checked on the Admin UI.
Let us say my zimbra server host is zimbrahost.company.com and its IP address is zimbraipaddr. and thus my domain is company.com. This is the same domain that I used when I installed the Zimbra server.


#cat /etc/resolv.conf

nameserver 172.18.20x.abc [primary DNS server for the Zimbra host]
nameserver 172.18.13y.def

#dig company.com mx

Answer section
company.com 85064 IN MX 10 mxp.sd.company.com

Additional section
mxp.sd.company.com 73291 IN A ipaddr1
mxp.sd.company.com 73291 IN A ipaddr2
mxp.sd.company.com 73291 IN A ipaddr3

Server: 172.18.20x.abc#53 (172.18.20x.abc) [This is the same primary DNS server for the Zimbra host]

#host `hostname`
This command does not work. It says host zimbrahost not found.


The problem that I am facing is that the emails successfully get routed to all the users that I have added on this Zimbra server. But if I try to send an email to any email address outside this Zimbra server, it fails and it says "connection timed out to yahoo". However, if I send email to my email address on my company's exchange server e.g. myname@mycorp.company.com then I receive a postmaster delivery failure message. Can you please help me solve this problem? Let me know if you need more information.

Thanks

[needhelpnow]

And yes, I have disabled firewall as well as SELinux on this host.

[phoenix]

#host `hostname`
This command does not work. It says host zimbrahost not found.

That would imply your hosts file is incorrect, please post the contents of that file.

#dig company.com mx

Answer section
company.com 85064 IN MX 10 mxp.sd.company.com

Additional section
mxp.sd.company.com 73291 IN A ipaddr1
mxp.sd.company.com 73291 IN A ipaddr2
mxp.sd.company.com 73291 IN A ipaddr3

Why do you appear to have the same hostname pointing to three different(?) IP addresses or am I misunderstanding what you've posted.

[carlsanders]

Your new zimbra server *is* a mail server, and needs an MX record.

I also don't understand why you have three different IPs for the same
MX host, but that's a different issue.

What does the "hostname" command return?

[needhelpnow]

Thanks for being so responsive and helpful guys. Here's the info that you wanted.

The IP addresses are three different ones for the same mxp.sd.company.com host. So there are three IPs mapped to this same host and that's why the three lines in the additional section.

#host `hostname`
Host zimbramailhost not found: 2 (SERVFAIL)

#host `zimbramailhost`
command not found.

#host -t mx domainname
domainname mail is handled by 10 mxp.sd.company.com

#cat /etc/hosts
127.0.0.1 localhost.localdomain localhost
myipaddr zimbramailhost.company.com zimbramailhost
All other lines in the file are commented out.

My installation was successful and I can run admin console etc.

Where do I add the MX record? In the primary corporate DNS server?