covertr@gtephx.UUCP (Richard E. Covert) (10/20/88)
We have a network of Apollo D3000 and D4000 (around 300 hundred of them!!) in an apollo network. We can't seem to get uucp and readnew/vnews to handle the network properly. the problem is that the local node name (Neptune for example) is tagged to the end of our uucp address. WE don't use the node name, so we can't send e-mail in response to messages on newsgroups. We have to manually edit the address of the person that the e-mail is directed towards to remove the local node name (again Neptune for example). Does anyone else have this problem?? If so, how did you fix it?? Please post your response as we may not get it otherwise. Also, I need to know what is the latest version of readnews/vnews etc. We might have an old copy, who knows>>
vskahan@lgnp1.MASA.COM (Vince Skahan) (10/23/88)
In article <3f2be90d.14e07@gtephx.UUCP>, covertr@gtephx.UUCP (Richard E. Covert) writes: > We have a network of Apollo D3000 and D4000 (around 300 hundred of them!!) > in an apollo network. We can't seem to get uucp and readnew/vnews to handle the > network properly. the problem is that the local node name (Neptune for example) > is tagged to the end of our uucp address. WE don't use the node name, so > we can't send e-mail in response to messages on newsgroups. We have to manually > edit the address of the person that the e-mail is directed towards to remove there are a couple of ways around it...you can change your UUCP mailer to hard-code the USENET gateway name in as the sending host (rather than the nodename of the node you're writing on). the other way (which is a bit easier) is to use smail as the UUCP mailer in sendmail.cf and compile smail to hard-code the USENET gateway name in. I'm also looking for a prettier solution (one that's easy but ugly is to just change the /sys/node_data/thishost name of *every* host to the gateway's name - the host*name* isn't used for anything but generating the mail from/reply addresses and you can put anything there with no problems...) ==> be aware that the folks at Apollo don't like the idea of messing with what's in the thishost file... -- Vince Skahan UUCP: lgnp1!vskahan Internet: skahan@boeing.com
krowitz@RICHTER.MIT.EDU (David Krowitz) (10/24/88)
My guess is that you sendmail.cf file (the sendmail configuration file in /usr/lib) contains a line which reads the local node name into a variable which is used in constructing the address. The line in our file looks something like: # The $w macro is preset by sendmail to the current host's # name. Here we simply capture the value in our own $A macro. # DA$w # # The $D macro will be the domain for this machine. If your machine # is part of a registered domain, that name should be defined here. # If you don't have a domain, leave it defined as "local". Some typical # domains are DEC.COM, ARPA, MIT.EDU, CSS.GOV. # DDmit.edu # # These are other "domains" in which this machine may be named. They # are used to recognize all forms of name for the local machine. # CDlocal uucp # # The $j macro is the name presented to remote SMTP servers when # establishing a mail connection. It should always be your fully # qualified domain name. # Dj$w.$D # # The $U macro is the name of this machine for UUCP communications. # It is usually the same as the normal host name, but may need to be # different for political reasons. # DU$w In this particular case, you would want to redefine the $u macro so that every machine gave the name of your UUCP gateway rather than their own name. Your sendmail.cf file probably has some similar stuff near the top of the file. Remember that you need to delete the sendmail.fc file (the compiled version of sendmail.cf) after making the changes in the .cf file. Otherwise the mailer will read the .fc file instead of the new .cf file. You can recreate the .fc file after editing the .cf file by typing the command "sendmail -bz". -- David Krowitz krowitz@richter.mit.edu (18.83.0.109) krowitz%richter@eddie.mit.edu krowitz%richter@athena.mit.edu krowitz%richter.mit.edu@mitvma.bitnet (in order of decreasing preference)
krowitz@RICHTER.MIT.EDU (David Krowitz) (10/25/88)
BAD IDEA! the `node_data/thishost file, along with the `node_data/networks file, is used by TCP/IP to determine the host's name and network connections. You're messing with X-windows, rsh, rlogin, fpt, telnet, etc. in addition to playing with UUCP. You can potentially break a lot of software. It's much better to change your mailer's configuration file to hard-code the gateway name. You only have to change 1 one in the network (rather than 1 file on each node on the network), and you don't break any other software. -- David Krowitz krowitz@richter.mit.edu (18.83.0.109) krowitz%richter@eddie.mit.edu krowitz%richter@athena.mit.edu krowitz%richter.mit.edu@mitvma.bitnet (in order of decreasing preference)
vskahan@lgnp1.MASA.COM (Vince Skahan) (10/25/88)
In article <8810241709.AA01180@richter.mit.edu>, krowitz@RICHTER.MIT.EDU (David Krowitz) writes: > BAD IDEA! the `node_data/thishost file, along with the > `node_data/networks file, is used by TCP/IP to determine > the host's name and network connections. You're messing with > X-windows, rsh, rlogin, fpt, telnet, etc. in addition to playing > with UUCP. You can potentially break a lot of software. It's much > better to change your mailer's configuration file to hard-code > the gateway name. You only have to change 1 one in the network > (rather than 1 file on each node on the network), and you don't > break any other software. I've set all /sys/node_data/thishost files to be the same on a ring with absolutely no effects that broke software. The thishost file provides the hostname for mail and rwho (among other things)...It has absolutely no effect on the operation of the ftpd or telnetd (I can't speak for X or NFS). My point (which I guess I didn't make well enough) was that you don't necessarily have to go through the pain of messing with the brain-dead default APollo sendmail.cf to hard-code the USENET gateway name. You can change thishost (I agree, it's ugly but it does work), you can compile smail to use the gateway name (safe and effective when used as directed). I agree that the best solution is to mess with sendmail.cf if you can devote the time to it. One question...the example sendmail.cf you quoted sure looks word-for-word like the one I took from an Ultrix Vax (I run an Ultrix .cf file to be able to parse user%host@next_host without choking)...are you running an ultrix .cf file or did you get a new (post 9.5) sendmail.cf from apollo ??? -- Vince Skahan UUCP: lgnp1!vskahan Internet: skahan@boeing.com
lwk@CAEN.ENGIN.UMICH.EDU (Woody Kellum) (10/27/88)
>In article <3f2be90d.14e07@gtephx.UUCP>, covertr@gtephx.UUCP (Richard E. Covert) writes: >> [...]. the problem is that the local node name (Neptune for example) >> is tagged to the end of our uucp address. WE don't use the node name, so Seems to me there is a #define in the netnews software which allows you to specify what the return address will look like. My guess is the defs.h header file.