On Monday 22 September 2003 20:35, Dean Anderson wrote: > On Mon, 22 Sep 2003, Larry Smith wrote: > > > You don't seem to understand how mail works. In both cases you get a > > > bounce. In neither case is a message sent. > > > > Hmmm, again not totally true. In the first case (pre-Versign) the mail > > "client" (user end of the equation - at least on all my servers) would > > get an "invalid address" type error (whatever Microsoft dreams up) and > > hence the message would never "leave" their machine. In the second case > > (post-Verisign) the message is accepted by my server (since it cannot > > tell at that stage) and it (my server) will then try to deliver. > > Depending upon the error code, the server might bounce immediately, or it > > might try for "x" amount of time before it bounces. > > You missed the start of this discussion, I think. This is what Doug Boyer > said. However, the MUA should always hand the message to the MTA portion, > and the MTA should always return a bounce. We just went through why the > MUA shouldn't be performing these checks. You might want to go back > through the recent archives and look at this discussion. > > --Dean Have followed the thread and am aware of what has been said. Point still remains, your comment is that in "neither" case will the message get delivered - and my comment was "not totally true". I am not referring to the MUA doing the check, I am referring to it being done at the MTA upon hand-off from the MUA. Pre-Verisign "many" mail servers (mine included) would "reject" a bogus or non-existant address _before_ receipt of the message from the MUA therefore leaving the message on the client/customer machine (at the MUA). Post-Verisign there is no such thing as a "non-existant" com or net domain from the MTA point of view (eg: it will get an "answer" to any and all queries for MX - the "A" record for verisign) hence the message is accepted by the MTA [ this constitues first "delivery"], then it (the MTA) attempts to deliver - and _then_ fails and is presumably returned to the originator. If I am technically incorrect please let me know, but your comment was - and I quote >>> In both cases you get a > > > bounce. In neither case is a message sent. which is at least "partly" incorrect. The acceptance of a message by an MTA for delivery constitutes a "send" condition to the MUA. Check any mail software you wish. If you/your mail software hand a message off to the "next" machine/system/server in your particular mail chain - then to your mail software the message _has_ been sent. Any Outlook user can prove this by simply checking their "sent" message folder. The fact that it is immediately or subsequently returned does not mean it was not "sent". This is what verisign has "changed"... -- Larry Smith SysAd ECSIS.NET sysad@ecsis.net