So I assume the SMTP AUTH setting is the "Advertise AUTH capability".
Ah, yes. Subtleties, always subtleties.
The SIMS server will accept SMTP AUTH authentication whether it "advertises it" or not. The "advertise auth" actually controls whether or not the server tells clients that is accepts AUTH. It used to confuse older clients (that couldn't do auth) if they saw this from servers. So most servers stopped advertising it, and so most modern clients do AUTH based on a user preference rather than on whether or not the server advertises it.
Bottom line: it doesn't much matter what you do with this setting. Might as well turn it on.
I have setup my mail client to use authentication (Eudora) and noticed that it seemed to use an md5 hash of some sort (at least that's what the progress indicator reported), so it must be using it properly.
Probably.
How can I be sure?
Run Eudora on a non-trusted host (i.e., not one in the SIMS Client Hosts list), don't retrieve mail for a while (or turn off the SIMS "temporarily trust authenticated hosts" setting), and then try sending mail from Eudora to your SIMS box that's addressed to someone NOT on your SIMS box. (Me, for example.) Sending mail to yourself will not test this properly, see below.
Also, will NOT having SMTP authentication turned on in the mail client prohibit them from sending via this box from outside our LAN?
If you turn off the "temporarily trust authenticated hosts" setting, then yes. More precisely, SIMS will refuse to RELAY any message from a non-client host that doesn't use SMTP auth to prove that the sender has a local SIMS account. Note that messages for local users will still be accepted whether the sender authenticates or not. That's why, in the paragraph above, you had to send a message to me.
dan
Thanks,
Chris
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