360971 - Add relay Personality or location-based method for selecting SMTP server

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Penelope Graveyard :: General, defect, P5)

Description

[Matt Dudziak]

From the wiki:
I really need the relay ability as verizon does not let me use other email severs to send out my domain mail.

Penelope should support a relay Personality like Eudora, or should provide some other location-based mechanism to automatically or manually set the smtp server to use at a given moment. If you agree, vote for this bug.

Comment 1

[Kwan]

I agree with the need to change the SMTP server on a location basis, rather than on a personality basis. I don't know that the current method employed by Eudora is the most efficient, since it requires you to create a new personality for each location-based SMTP server. Then you have to go through the preferences dialog box to access it. Quite cumbersome.

Comment 2

[Robin Darroch]

On the Mac version, the ability to map "Location" (from the Network system prefs) to an associated SMTP server within Eudora would be excellent.  Not sure what the best mapping would be for the Windows version, but this would be an extremely valuable feature for me.

Comment 3

[Sheldon King]

Guys - think further down the track. Follow what Apple Mail does with Relay servers - tries any and all SMTP servers it has on record and only alerts the user if *none* of them work. No interface work required, no user intervention, seamless mail relaying for those of us who are always out and about.

** Extension
This idea requires more work but would cover all the bases.

A preference is added that says:

[ X ] Prompt for relay server information when sending fails

The result of this choice would be for  Eudora/Thunderbird to prompt the user with the following dialog if all relay attempts fail:

<Mail could not be sent because outgoing mail server is not available. 

- cancel - - add new mail server ->

"add new mail server" prompts for credentials for a new outgoing mail server which, if correct, is optionally added to the list of relay servers on file.

Comment 4

[steve]

Whatever. All I know is that silly verizon wont let me send mail out on other mail servers. I dont get it. The problem is that verizon caps the total outgoing no. of msgs. Any way to get around this with Penelope?

Comment 5

[Joseph W Donahue]

Assuming this feature request is for being able to configure separate smtp/POP servers on a per persona basis as in Eudora, I'm all for it.  Does Thunderbird not allow this?  Until I have a clearer idea just what this feature really is, I am not going to vote for it.    

Comment 6

[Matt Dudziak]

(In reply to comment #4)
> Whatever. All I know is that silly verizon wont let me send mail out on other
> mail servers. I dont get it. The problem is that verizon caps the total
> outgoing no. of msgs. Any way to get around this with Penelope?
> 

Are you saying that Verizon limits the number of recipients on a single email message, or the total number of messages you can send in a(n) hour/day/week/month/year?

If the limit is the total number of recipients permitted on a single email, there is currently no way to tell either Eudora nor Thunderbird (Penelope) to break the message into multiple messages, each with fewer than that limit of recipients.

Sounds like a cool feature to me to have an option to send x messages to y people instead of 1 message to x*y people, where y is less than the limit Verizon imposes. Somewhat related to https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=359426 as Penelope would need similar smarts for both....

Matt

Comment 7

[steve]

(In reply to comment #6)
> (In reply to comment #4)
> > Whatever. All I know is that silly verizon wont let me send mail out on other
> > mail servers. I dont get it. The problem is that verizon caps the total
> > outgoing no. of msgs. Any way to get around this with Penelope?
> > 
> 
> Are you saying that Verizon limits the number of recipients on a single email
> message, or the total number of messages you can send in a(n)
> hour/day/week/month/year?
> 
> If the limit is the total number of recipients permitted on a single email,
> there is currently no way to tell either Eudora nor Thunderbird (Penelope) to
> break the message into multiple messages, each with fewer than that limit of
> recipients.
> 
> Sounds like a cool feature to me to have an option to send x messages to y
> people instead of 1 message to x*y people, where y is less than the limit
> Verizon imposes. Somewhat related to
> https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=359426 as Penelope would need
> similar smarts for both....
> 
> Matt
> 

Its both.
Verizon lets me send out mail via eudora that appears to come from "[e-mail]" but is actually from "[e-mail]" via that outgoing mailserver. I pick up the mail with eudora at the anydomain-I-own.com mailserver. Fortunately Eudora lets me do that via this:
http://www.eudora.com/techsupport/kb/2107hq.html

The problem is that I have 9 sep. domain emails and all the email I send out on all of them counts for the total below. Here is the stupid verizon policy from their website:

9/1/06
Limitations on Sending E-mail
The following limits apply with respect to the sending of e-mail from your verizon.net e-mail account. These rules are in place in order to help fight spam (that is, unsolicited e-mail).
    * You may send a single e-mail message to a maximum of 100 recipients in one mailing. If you include more than 100 addressees in an e-mail, the e-mail will NOT be delivered to ANY of the recipients. You should receive an error message if this limitation is triggered.
    * If you send e-mails to more than 500 recipients within a one hour period, your ability to send ANY e-mail messages will be suspended for 24 hours. You should receive a notice from us if this limitation is triggered.

Comment 8

[Sheldon King]

Many ISPs impose different rules on sending e mail, and I don't think it's the role of the e mail client to be able to weedle it's way around them. 

Adding features to get around specific ISP restrictions is the top of a slippery slope I don't think any of us want to do down.

I think the comments about locating SMTP servers and the level of flexibility that mobile users need is an important consideration (as I outlined earlier in this post) but I don't think that configuration options down to the ISP level is necessarily desirable or achievable.

Comment 9

[steve]

(In reply to comment #8)
> Many ISPs impose different rules on sending e mail, and I don't think it's the
> role of the e mail client to be able to weedle it's way around them. 
> 
> Adding features to get around specific ISP restrictions is the top of a
> slippery slope I don't think any of us want to do down.
> 
> I think the comments about locating SMTP servers and the level of flexibility
> that mobile users need is an important consideration (as I outlined earlier in
> this post) but I don't think that configuration options down to the ISP level
> is necessarily desirable or achievable.
> 

I agree I just want lots of SMTP options. Right now Eudora works for about 95% of my mail needs. So if its not broke dont fix it.

Comment 10

[Michael A. Pasek]

I'm voting for the this enhancement; specifically, the "location-based" version.  I have an email account (i.e., "Personality") that can be accessed via one domainname/port combination (split DNS, "private" IP, port 110) when I'm "local", but must be accessed via a different domainname/port combination ("public" IP, port other than 110) when I'm "roaming".  With Eudora 6.2.4, I have the two settings saved in a text file, and copy/paste the appropriate one into the "Personality" setting depending on where I am.  Being able to specify different Mail and/or SMTP servers, or even many other "Personality" settings based on a location would be a great help for the "road warriors" out there.

I'd disagree with Sheldon King (comment #3) that ALL known relays should be tried; in my case, when "roaming", theSMTP server (the one used when I'm "local") does not allow relaying of mail purportedly from my domains.  Attempting to relay would trigger an automatic add of a DNS RBL entry for the IP address attempting to "relay" (ME!).  I suspect that many other SMTP servers are similarly configured to not allow "external" relaying, and may similarly (although maybe not quite so permanently) blacklist the sending IP.

Comment 11

[Sylvestre Ledru [:Sylvestre]]

Penelope didn't see any activity in the vcs for the last 8 years, closing.