Can anyone provide a step-by-step process, or a link to a tutorial of some kind, on how to add a Reverse DNS Record to a DNS table for a domain.

I can't find any reference to this in the HMS help section.

We've had a number of emails bounced from larger ISP's stating we don't have a Reverse DNS Record for our mailserver.

Thanks.

This only really applies if you have a dedicated server or a VPS account.

If you are on a shared mailserver, all of our shared mailservers already have reverse DNS records in place.

Regardless, you'll need to open a ticket with support - give us a call or send an email into support and we'll get it taken care of for you.

Thanks - we're on a VPS+ - I'll open a ticket.

About Reverse DNS-

As far as I understand....If you have a dedicated or VPS every domain that sends mail must have a dedicated ip in order to set the Reverse DNS up correctly. This means that 1 ip for your VPS is ridiculous. Probaly not worth sharing IP's just set every site up with its own so the RVS DNS works right.

Am I correct here? Anyone?

RDNS is probably one of the most misunderstood topics, so I'll post here to clarify. Recipient mailservers do typically check for RDNS, but the RDNS values do NOT need to have any relationship to the actual domain name of the email's sender.

In other words, all of your domains on the VPS can send out even if your RNDS record only references a single one of those domains. What is required is the following:

1. The IP your VPS sends through (i.e. the primary external IP) MUST have a PTR record (called RDNS) that points to a domain name.
2. The domain name it points to must in turn point back to the IP.
3. Clarification: The IP points to ONE DOMAIN, and that ONE DOMAIN points back to the IP address and nothing else.

Think of it as an unbroken 'loop' and you've got the idea. The only other configuration to check, which isn't quite RDNS, is the "host name" in Smartermail on your VPS. This is in the General Settings and it defines what name the server 'announces' itself as when it opens communications with other mailservers. For the sake of simplicity the HOST NAME should match the domain found in your RDNS record, though that's not strictly required (all that is required is that the Host Name is a fully qualified domain name, i.e. domain.xyz).

LMK if you have any questions.

Thanks for the clarification Jamie. In other words I was wrong... only one domain has to have reverse DNS set up, the primary. All other domains that send mail thru the server essentially use the primary domain and IP for RDNS verification.

thanks again. So unless I need an SSL cert I dont need anymore IP...

That's correct. Don't feel bad though - new techs often get confused at that too for some reason, so it's a pretty common mistake.

This is a distinct but related question which I thought might usefully be kept with this thread.

I use a single instance of SmarterMail on my VPS+ to send and receive mail for two domains, memdir.org and supportequality.org. Mail flows appropriately but dnsstuff.com complains that the mail server greeting is "mail.memdir.org" even when the server is dealing with supportequality.org email. (copy of dnsstuff warning appended)

I've raised this with HMS support and I implemented the suggested IIS changes but dnsstuff still isn't happy. Is there a way to fix this or is it an intrinsic issue when a single SmarterMail server is acting for more than one domain?

Thanks,
Bob Mack

WARN Mail server host name in greeting WARNING: One or more of your mailservers is claiming to be a host other than what it really is (the SMTP greeting should be a 3-digit code, followed by a space or a dash, then the host name). If your mailserver sends out E-mail using this domain in its EHLO or HELO, your E-mail might get blocked by anti-spam software. This is also a technical violation of RFC821 4.3 (and RFC2821 4.3.1). Note that the hostname given in the SMTP greeting should have an A record pointing back to the same server. Note that this one test may use a cached DNS record.

supportequality.org claims to be host mail.memdir.org [but that host is at 208.112.67.15 (may be cached), not 208.112.67.162]. <br />

Well, DNSSTUFF isn't free anymore and I don't have a login, so I can't do too much testing here....

but if you login as the System Admin to Smartermail, then goto Settings->Protocol Settings there should be a tab for HOST NAMES.

"Hostnames
This feature allows Administrators to assign a hostname for each IP address. For example: IP 1.1.1.1 can assigned to mail.domain1.com and IP 1.1.1.2 can be for mail.domain2.com. Prior to this addition, SmarterMail could only specify one hostname for all IPs."

This feature is in Smartermail v4.3; not sure what you're running but if it's a 4.x version you can upgrade for free and get access to that tab - this is a recent update to Smartermail, I think, because I don't remember it from when I ran the mailservers.

That did the trick, Jamie. Dnsstuff is happy with my domains for the first time ever. Thanks, Bob

You're quite welcome! Just think - you're also lucky enough to have me as a sales rep!