Getting email accepted by another domain has become quite a headache for systems administrators. Because of security issues, mail servers have had to clamp down on who exactly will be permitted to send mail to their users. I’m still encountering intermittent problems with some domains accepting our emails; although the big offenders like AOL and MSN/Hotmail have been largely resolved with the simple addition of SPF records to our DNS zones. However, two more providers have cropped up in my attempts to get my users open email access everywhere. Some ISPs such as consolidated.net have a baffling bounceback message either referencing an old (perhaps retired) RBL server or a cryptic, generic refusal. Whereas GoDaddy, one of the biggest domain registrars out there, has some strict requirements and configurations that I’m still trying to guess at.
I’ve added via WHM more SPF records via TXT type to not only the main domains and parked domains, but also to their nameserver records and to the hostname DNS records as well. Anything that has the remote chance of showing up in a header check now has a SPF record. Here’s to hoping I made some progress.
I’ve been troubleshooting email send/receive issues for as long as I remember, usually in most varieties of Windows mail clients, including Outlook Express and Windows Mail. Eliminating any remote mail server issues, sending and receiving emails tend to be the most frequent problems encountered–often fixed by diagnosing the network connection (checking settings or rebooting a router), turning off any aggressive firewalls and antivirus programs, or even recreating the user’s mail profile in the client.Again, as long as the issue isn’t related to mail relaying and port 25 blocking (which many ISPs are in the habit of doing), then try the following steps to clear/reset TCP/IP on a client machine:
The above requires Administrator privileges to run from a command line. It will also request a PC reboot. The following article also provides more instruction on resetting TCP/IP on a Windows-based machine.
Today, during a routine plugin update, I discovered that WP 3.0 has a implemented a maintenance mode, which effectively takes the site “offline”. To be specific, visitors receive a message indicating the unavailability of the site during maintenance operations. Of course, I encountered a failure (most likely related to the timeout issues that I’ve been experiencing with this server) during an upgrade from the Admin Dashboard which prevented me from logging back into the site. Any attempt to pull up the blog or the admin panel resulted in a page displaying: “Briefly unavailable for scheduled maintenance. Check back in a minute.”
The fix was to log in to the site via FTP and delete the .maintenance file located at the blog root. This restored access to the site.
However, I wish there was an option from the Dashboard which allowed an administrator to toggle maintenance mode manually, instead of automatically assuming that the site should be taken down. Upgrading from the dashboard doesn’t work 100% of the time, and I foresee that the file deletion fix will occur more frequently than one expects.
After what seems like an eternity figuring out IIS7 on Server 2008, along comes Microsoft’s Web Platform Installer (Web PI) which makes installing and configuring PHP, MySQL and WordPress a snap! I discovered this easy 5 Minute Install on Windows section while I was reviewing the codex for 3.0 installation info. No more headaches trying to configure each entity separately in IIS…Web PI does it for you.
As a follow up, it’s always important to make sure that the appropriate internet account is set up for the Default Application Pool (DefaultAppPool). Make sure IUSR_servername is correctly added to the IIS_IUSRS group, then assign it to the Identity of DefaultAppPool.
One more important feature to enhance your interface with MySQL is the installation of phpMyAdmin, which makes managing MySQL and WordPress tremendously easy. The linked walkthrough also includes instruction on how to modify your PHP install to add some much needed extensions for phpMyAdmin (and some WordPress plugins you may find useful).
Thankfully WordPress is quite good at combatting comment spam. Akismet is a very effective front-line defense against all kinds of spam. The WordPress FAQ on this subject also provides some additional ammo in the war against spammers.