There could be a problem connecting back to your public IP from inside the LAN, depending on router/firewall settings. Anyway, feel free to send connection details and we'll make some tests.

EDIT: Before getting into the the breadth of this post, I guess I should ask a simple question. Since I'm using DDNS for my hosting purposes, and that typically isn't recommended for email servers...is there a way to setup mercury to use something like a gmail account to relay messages from one of my websites and both send and receive messages from that specific domain? So if I had a domain named xxx.com, and wanted to send/receive email from that domain, could I use email@gmail.com to send/receive messages for email@xxx.com? If there's a way to do that...I think that might be the easier option than answering the questions I have below... 

Hi Guys,

Sorry for the length in advance, but I wanted to be as thorough as possible. I'm a windows iis/pop convert to xampp/mercury, and am still learning the in's and out's of the system so bare with me :)

I've got the latest xammp setup running on windows 7 ultimate with apache, mysql, and mercury. I was able to send emails with mercury in almost no time at all, but have spent the last 2 days trying to figure out how to receive a single email to no avail. In trying to narrow down the location of the problem, I think it may actually be my ISP, but can't be entirely sure.  I'll send test emails from both my gmail and yahoo accounts to my domain, but (as far as I can tell), they never make it to my pop3 mercury server.

 I've got xampp running multiple virtual sites on a single machine. I have a cable modem/router that has configureable virtual servers and port triggering - but NO port forwarding. I assume that isn't a big deal because I've read virtual servers are the same thing as port forwarding. As my ISP wanted $16/month (ridiculous!) to get a static IP address, I went the dynamic dns route. So my cable modem is setup on a DHCP basis with my ISP. I setup virtual servers and port triggers (are the port triggers even necessary?) to forward ports 25 to 25, 143 to 143, and 110 to 110 (not worried about encryption just yet...just want to get something that works!)

 I thought that this might be an NAT issue with my router, and tried a bridged connection on my cable router, which immediately locked me out of the GUI and screwed up my password, causing me to have to reset the router to the factory settings and start all over from scratch. I will say that when I look at my hostname tied to my public IP address, it isn't any of my domains, it's some obscure sudomain of my ISP like csub-ipaddress.is.com - so that might be causing the problem.

Since it appeared that the emails I sent weren't reaching my pop server, I tried a number of things:

1) I ran a tracert on my public domain and subdomain, and both successfully resolved my DHCP ISP generated public IP address (unless I had my hosts file setup to direct them straight to the local machine). Although, I'm not sure I'm doing this right. My tracert basically makes it to my router and looks like it bounces right back with my public IP. It doesn't appear to be actually going out on the web, and circling back to my public IP.

2) I telneted in on the local machine and was able to bring up the ESMTP server, and the pop server by typing in > telnet domain.com port (25 or 110)

3) How do I set it up so mercury recognizes multiple domains? I need to clairfy what a domain is as well.  When we say domain, are we referring to the individual .com websites I have running, or the traditional workgroup/domain the computer is a member of? Do you do this under the core module, under local domains? Since I'm using virtual servers with xampp to direct traffic internally, I couldn't always get telnet to connect to a specific domain - but I COULD always get it to connect to localhost whch I thought was weird.

4) Where I think the problem lies: So I used both mxtoolbox and nmap to try to make sure all the proper ports were open. Now my router has the proper virtual servers configured (and port triggers if they're even required?), however both nmap and mxtoolbox never showed port 25 or 110 as being open. They only showed port 143 as being open, and that was only some of the time - not all of the time. It's my guess ( so please correct me if I'm wrong ) that the people at my ISP have a bridged connection to my cable router, and even though I open ports 25 and 110 open on my router, the ISP has the ports closed. In essence, the bridged connection may show a single IP address, but there are multiple levels of access - at the ISP level, and at my router level. If the ISP says no go, the ports won't appear open even if my cable router is configured to allow access?

My main issue is I don't get any returned failed emails, so I have no idea what the error is that's causing the test emails to fail :( 

 Any help is GREATLY appreciated, because I've just about pulled out all my hair at ths point :(

 Thanks in advance! 

I'm afraid that the configuration for Mercury that comes with xampp can be a bit confusing. Please post the contents of your mercury.ini file (remove passwords or possible other sensitive stuff, but leave all the rest untouched!) so we can be sure that all settings are reasonable, including local domains.

The MercuryS log file is the best place to look to see if someone has been able to connect using SMTP.

Are you able to access the help system in Mercury at the moment? If not I would suggest upgrading to beta version 4.80 as that information is more or less needed to run the mail server properly. 

Hi Rolf. Thanks for lending a hand :) Here's my .ini file:

 #  MERCURY.INI generated by Mercury Setup

#

#

#  Sample Bindery Mode MERCURY.INI file (in fact, the one I use on

#  my production server). This one implements most of the possible

#  switches for each module, but you can edit it to do less if you

#  wish. All the fields shown below are described in the file

#  MGUIDE.HLP which is supplied in the Mercury archive.

#

#  Anything after a '#' to the end of the line is a comment and

#  is stripped out before parsing. Trailing and leading whitespace

#  is also stripped before parsing. Many sample commands have been

#  left in this file commented out for reference purposes.

#

[General]

myname:          smtp.mydomain.com    # Canonical name for this server

timezone:        +0000    # Time Zone to add to date fields

file_api:        1    # Use the file api instead of queues

mailqueue:       C:\XAMPP\MERCURYMAIL\QUEUE    # Where mail should be put for delivery

smtpqueue:       C:\XAMPP\MERCURYMAIL\QUEUE    # Where the SMTP client should look for mail

newmail_path:    C:\XAMPP\MERCURYMAIL\MAIL\~N    # Where to find the users' WinPMail mailboxes.

[Protocols]

MERCURYS.DLL

MERCURYP.DLL

MERCURYE.DLL

# MERCURYC.DLL

MERCURYD.DLL

# MERCURYH.DLL

# MERCURYF.DLL

# MERCURYW.DLL

# MERCURYX.DLL

# MERCURYI.DLL

# MERCURYB.DLL

[Mercury]

failfile:      C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Mercury\FAILURE.MER    # Delivery failure notification template

confirmfile:   C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Mercury\CONFIRM.MER    # Delivery confirmation template

aliasfile:     C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Mercury\ALIAS.MER    # System-wide alias file

synfile:       C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Mercury\SYNONYM.MER    # User synonym database

listfile:      C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Mercury\LISTS.MER    # List of lists

logwidth:      30    # Width of address fields in logfile

retpath:       1    # Do/Don't use 'return-path' for errors

maxhops:       30    # Used to detect mailing loops

gullible:      0    # If NZ, don't validate 'From' fields

bitnethost:    cunyvm.cuny.edu    # Relay host for '.bitnet' rewrites

poll:          10   # Seconds between queue polling cycles

scratch:       C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Scratch    # Where we can write temp files

returnlines:   15    # How many lines of failed messages to return

postmaster:    Admin    # NetWare UIC of postmaster

broadcast:     0    # Yes, we want broadcast notifications, but

receipts:      0    # ... no broadcasts for receipt confirmations

PM_notify:     1    # Do/Don't send errors to the postmaster

change_owner:  0    # Change message ownership to recipient

auto_tzone:    1    # If NZ, obtain timezone information from OS

LogLevel:      15    # System message reporting level

LogMax:        100    # Maximum number of system messages to store

RetryPeriod:   30    # Period between job retries (minutes)

MaxRetries:    16    # Maximum number of times a job can fail

TwoPasses:     1    # If NZ, process submission queue in 2 passes

Autoaddress:   0    # If NZ, auto-generate user addresses based on name

Daily_exit:    0    # If NZ, auto-restart each day after maintenance

No_Areply:     0    # If NZ, disable automatic replies system-wide

Alt_Forward:   0    # If NZ, allow alternate forwarding specification

Maint_hour:    2    # Hour for daily maintenance (24-hour clock)

Maint_min:     0    # Minute for daily maintenance

Retry_Mode:    0    # If NZ, use progressive backoff for queue retries

Local_DSNs:    1    # If NZ generate Delivery Status for local users only

DSN_time1:     10800    # Seconds deferred before first DSN is sent

DSN_time2:     86400    # Seconds deferred before second DSN is sent

DSN_time3:     259200    # Seconds deferred before third DSN is sent

Host_in_title: 0    # If NZ, show hostname in system tray and taskbar

Lingering:     0    # Enable or disable 'lingering mailboxes'

Linger_Timeout: 60   # Seconds before a lingering mailbox is shut down

Alert_Host:    notify.pmail.com    # Host to check for licensee advisories

Alert_Interval: 720   # Frequency in minutes (min 240) for checks

Alert_Flags:   3    # Flags controlling advisory checks

[MercuryC]

Host : smtp.gmail.com

Failfile : C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Mercury\FAILURE.MER

Poll : 30

Scratch : C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Mercury

ReturnLines : 15

Timeout : 30

ESMTP : 1

Server_Port : 465

SMTP_Username:mygmailaccount@gmail.com

SMTP_Password: xxxxxx

SMTP_ConnFlags : 8

POP3_Auth : 0

Log_Verbose : 0

[MercuryE]

HELO : 127.0.0.1

Poll : 15

Timeout : 60

Nameservers : 8.8.8.8

Log_Verbose : 0

DNS_Timeout : 20

DNS_Retries : 4

Transcripts : 1

MaxThreads : 10

[MercuryD]

Scratch : C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Mercury

Timeout : 30

Poll : 30

[MercuryS]

Debug : 1

HELO : 127.0.0.1

Logfile : C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Logs\MERCURYS.LOG

Timeout : 30

Relay : 1

Strict_Relay : 0

Interface : 127.0.0.1

Allow_Illegals : 0

SMTP_Authentication : 0

Compliance_Settings : 0

Maximum_Failed_Rcpts : 4

Max_Relay_Attempts : 4

SSL_Mode : 0

ST_Blacklisting : 288

No_VRFY : 0

SMTP_ConnFlags : 0

[MercuryP]

Scratch : C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Mercury

Stack : 32768

Interface : 127.0.0.1

Mark_Read : 1

SSL_Mode : 0

Login_Disabled : 0

UIDL_nul_list : 1

New_UIDs : 0

No_NUL_passwords : 1

Timeout : 60

[MercuryX]

# Cmd_Delay: 10

# Cmd_Wait: 1

# IE4_Dialling: 0

# Use_ETRN: 1

# Clients_only: 1

# Sunday: 0800,1800,3,15,30,60

# Monday: 0830,2100,5,15,60,60

# Tuesday: 0830,2100,5,15,60,60

# Wednesday: 1500,1900,2,30,5,30

# Thursday: 0900,1900,2,30,0,0

# Friday: 0830,2100,5,15,60,60

# Saturday: 1031,1035,2,45,-1,0

# [Groups]

# testgroup            :     TESTGRP

[Domains]

Computer Name: [192.168.x.x]

mydomain.com: localhost

mydomain.com: [127.0.0.1]

[Maiser]

Maiser:          Maiser   # 'Username' of mail server account

Helpfile:        C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Mercury\MAISER.HLP   # Help sent on failed maiser requests

Lookupfile:      C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Mercury\MAISER.LKP   # Format file for the 'lookup' command

Send_dir:        C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Mercury\SENDABLE   # Directory for the 'send' command

Logfile:         C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Logs\MAISER.LOG   # Mail server log file

Notify:          C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Mercury\TMP   # Dir. for pending 'notify' commands

NoList:          N   # If 'Y', disable the 'list' command

Local_only:      Y   # If 'Y', local 'notify' commands only

[MercuryH]

Logfile              :     C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\Logs\MERCURYH.LOG

# Addressbook : \\CLIO\SYS\SYSTEM\MERCURY\PH.PMR

# MOTD : \\CLIO\SYS\SYSTEM\MERCURY\PH-MOTD.TXT

# Administrator : postmaster@clio.pmail.gen.nz

Timeout : 30

[MercuryI]

Scratch : C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\SCRATCH

Timeout : 120

Server_Port : 143

Idle_Timeout : 1800

SSL_Mode : 0

Login_Disabled : 0

[MercuryB]

Scratch : C:\xampp\MERCURYMAIL\SCRATCH

Timeout : 120

Server_Port : 2224

Idle_Timeout : 1800

[Groups]

[Rewrite]

[Statistics]

StatFlags:    0  # Statistical reporting settings

STF_Hours:    24  # How often to write stat log files

STM_Hours:    24  # How often to e-mail stat log files

OK. So, generally speaking, the settings created by xampp are not good if you at all plan to use the server on the Internet.

Things to fix:

- Unless you have something reasonable to enter leave HELO blank. (See Mercury help.)

- Restricting Interface to 127.0.0.1 (loopback address) will prevent the server from communicating with the network. Should normally be blank.

- The moment MercuryS is connected to the Internet you must have settings to prevent unauthorized relaying or you will be blacklisted. At least set Relay 0 and Strict_Relay 1.

- Domains: Please read Mercury help carefully! This must be done correctly. The key on each line should be a simple hostname like "myserver" or whatever. It should be the same on all lines. All domains that Mercury will handle must be listed. Unless your computer actually is named "localhost" that is not a suitable value.

- Nameservers: You can specify servers to use, but in most cases simply leave it blank to use the same nameservers as Windows. 

There are probably more settings that can be tweaked according to your requirements, but those are presumably the main items to correct. Please read the PDF manual and Mercury help for more information. Restart of Mercury is of course required after changing mercury.ini.

Hi Rolf,

 Thanks for the help.  I had a few more questions.

EDIT: I don't think you need to read any further Rolf...the help section explains my questions on domains beautifully.  Thanks for all the help...I'll update you just to make sure everything works once I have everything confgured.  Thanks again for all the help :) 

I changed all the settings you recommended except the domains.  I've tried reading the help contents before, but all I get is "Why can't I get Help from this program?" from windows 7 whenever I try to open the help, so I've been flying blind. EDIT: I was able to correct this by getting a specific update from microsoft, so I can now view the contents :)

The only setting I have remaining issues from what you recommended above is the Domains. I wanted to clear some stuff up with this section. Let's use the following parameters in a fictitious example:

Operating System: Windows 7 Ultimate 

Computer Name: comp1 w/ local IP: 192.168.1.2 on subnet 255.255.255.0

Network Setup: Workgroup, DHCP from router at 192.168.1.1

Network Router/Gateway: 192.168.1.1 - Setup to DHCP from ISP for all settings (including DNS)  

DNS Settings: I use afraid.org's Dynamic DNS to update their DNS servers to make sure the IP address assigned to me by my ISP stays up to date. 

Xampp Stack: Xampp, Apache Running, MySQL Running, Mercury Running

Apache Virtual Server Domains: domain1.com alias www.domain1.com,  domain2.com alias www.domain2.com

 With those settings, how would you setup the local domains in the Mercury Core Module Configuration? Would it look something like this?:

Local host or server: comp1 | Internet Name: [192.168.1.2] 

I was also hoping you could clear something up for me. I have a manual in my mercury folder, but it's for pegasus. I thought pegasus was the equivalent of outlook or thunderbird? Is pegasus actually the mail server component or just client that connects to mercury?

Hi Rolf,

So I'm still running into a few issues.

I'm able to connect to my smtp server, but and the core process says it creates the outgoing job. When it gets to the MercuryE end-to-end SMTP Client, it's saying "Permanent Error 11001 non-existant host or domain resolving 'localhost'

 I can't figure out what the issue is :( 

127.0.0.1 is the loopback interface, so if you tell Mercury to only listen on that interface it will only accept connections coming from the same computer. If you leave that field blank Mercury will listen on all available network addresses. (See Mercury help!)

If you turn off strict relaying you should not have the server available from the Internet at all, as it will rather soon be used as a relay for spam, which in turn will cause your IP address to be blacklisted. Instead use the connection control settings in MercuryS configuration to specify that IP addresses in your LAN range should be allowed to relay through the server.

Sorry...couldn't update my previous post in time. I took out the loopback interface as 127.0.0.1 and now both are blank, but I'm still getting the 11001 error from MercuryE.

I'll turn the strict relay back on temporarily until I can at least send mail internally. 

Additionally:

Local host or server: comp1 | Internet Name: [192.168.1.2] 

comp1   comp1

comp1     [192.168.1.2] 

comp1    myfirstdomain.com 

comp1    myseconddomain.com 

etc.... 

I was also hoping you could clear something up for me. I have a manual in my mercury folder, but it's for pegasus. I thought pegasus was the equivalent of outlook or thunderbird? Is pegasus actually the mail server component or just client that connects to mercury? 

Pegasus is indeed an email client. If Mercury is properly installed there will be a PDF manual for Mercury in the main Mercury directory. Consider upgrading to version 4.80 to make sure the installation is complete. As I mentioned earlier that solves the help system problem as well.

Ok Rolf, Maybe this will help. I was able to retrieve the bounced emails from the postmaste account.

 They're all showing the 11001 error like before saying non-existant host or domain - so it has to be be I'm not setting up my local domains under my core config properly?  Even though I'm addressing the emails to user@domain.com, they're all trying to send the emails to user@localhost?

Ok...that's the exact setup I used, and I'm still getting the 11001 error. :( Let me ask you think, what should I set "Internet Name for this system" to under the general section of the core module? Does I tried both comp1 and domain1.com, and neither works :(

Check Mercury logs (or console windows) to see what actually is happening (MercuryS log, core log, MercuryE log). Verify as well that the settings in your email client are OK.

From Mercury help (always the best place to look for info!):  

Internet name for this system
Enter here the Internet name for the machine on which Mercury is running. Mercury will use this information when forming certain addresses, such as the postmaster address. The name you enter here should be a fully-qualified domain name; if you are intending to use Mercury to provide mail services outside your immediate organization, the name you provide will need to be publicly defined in your Domain Name Server (DNS) system.

I forgot to mention this and maybe it's the issue. I have domain.com resolving to 127.0.0.1 on my systems host file. Could that have something to do with it? I'll check out the logs.

Hey Rolf,

I think the problem lies with my ISP. Because I've tried a few online tools to see if it can connect to my smtp server and it cant..at least on port 25. If I send you my domain details in a pm, would you help me confirm if it's an issue with my ISP blocking things? I've gotten to the point where I can send and receive mail internally, and can send mail to an external address, but can't send email from external to internal :( 

 EDIT: I just found out it was listed on two blacklists because I used 127.0.0.1 as the server identifier...so I'm working to get those removed...but that still doesn't explain why I can't externally connect to my email server...