> Yes, there is no mx record for my ISP's outgoing SMTP server. > Should there be one ? It seems that only domains that are actually > having mail delivered to them should need an MX record.
The way that /mail/lib/remotemail invokes upas/smtp, it is giving smtp.cox.east.net as the domain to deliver the mail to. If the mx lookup returns zero entries then it dials the name directly, but if the mx returns a dns failure, then it waits for dns to unbreak. You could change /mail/lib/remotemail to say exec /bin/upas/smtp -g $addr -h $fd $addr $sender $* (e.g., add the -g $addr option) and that should dial the given address even when dns is failing. Otherwise, edit /sys/src/cmd/upas/smtp/mxdial.c is where to start, as Erik said. Russ
