SMTP Access Failure

[mcrispin]

c. 50 users, running OSX Server 10.4.11, not using OD (no binding to LDAP or any other directory service), not using Kerberos, not using DNS services locally – possible weak bandwidth availability; office is a homogenous mac environment. Server is Intel XServe Quad w/ 4GB RAM on GigE network.

A total server crash as a result of previous regime’s negligence over Labour Day forced a full rebuild of our single mail server. In a rush to get the office back and running, the migration of the dead server’s email to the newly rebuilt server was done hastily.

In the weeks that followed it became apparent that there were numerous IMAP syncing problems between mail.app and the central mail server. These errors included, creating folders where they shouldn’t be, bad characters in folders, and folders that appear to only be half synced and draft messages moved to bad directories. These problems existed before the server crash. All users use mail.app, all but 2 users are IMAP.

In the process of attempting to rebuild individual accounts by hand, which has been almost completely successful, a funny thing happened:

One user who uses three separate IMAP accounts on her single machine, is now being denied access to SMTP on two of the accounts for no apparent reason (2 different user names & passwords, same server), receiving is fine – sending is not. Deleting and Rebuilding the accounts does not work.

The odd thing, is that the HD on her laptop crashed at the same time as the rebuilding process was being initiated as confirmed by Diagnostic Tools.

One other interesting facet is this user is now being denied AFP access as the server is asking the user to change the password (which didn’t work). There is no binding in this environment, the accounts are local and all users are their own local admin – as such, I find it odd for OSX Server to ask such a thing, there are no rules for this set.

Oh – and all mailboxes are on the same domain, and SSL is being used (going around the certificate to the IP was also tried to no avail).

So happy mac people everywhere – why in the heck can’t my user access these two mailboxes SMTP access? And why can everyone else use SMTP just fine?

Looks like I am heading for a total rebuild, but I want to see all your opinions before loosing another weekend.

Thanks in advance, hope your holiday is without stress….

Michael Crispin
Marijuana Policy Project

[mcrispin]

Thanks for your help – it was an password server corruption in OD. I have less than 60 accounts, so while a pain the arse, I rebuilt the whole thing and all the problems went away. I suspect the corruption existed prior to the server crash in September and was pulled over in the migration. We don’t really micro-manage things like that, as you said – so the rebuild was the thing to do.

Again, thanks for your post.

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