Cannot email

[Timothy Stone]

Harry Putnam wrote:

> "John Jacks" <mibsun at gibnynex.gi> writes:
> 
> 
>>Hi ;
>>I am trying to email from my redhat box .This is what is happening .
>>[root at root]# ps -aux | sendmail
>>Recipient names must be specified
>>[root at root]# telnet localhost 25
>>Trying 127.0.0.1...
>>telnet: Unable to connect to remote host: Connection refused
> 
> 
> First .. looks like you are trying to use sendmail directly without
> supplying a `to' addressee.  `man sendmail' will guide you here:
>    sendmail [option ...] [recipient ...]
> 
> You probably ought to just use the `mail' tool which calls sendmail
> properly if you supply a recipient:
> 
>    ps waux|mail recipient
> 
> or if you want a subject:
>   
>    ps waux| mail -s "ps output" recipient
> 
> Calling sendmail direct will work though if you give a recipient.
> 
> Far as telnet goes... is sendmail even running?
> I get the same message as you posted if I turn sendmail off temporarily.
> 
> Try as root:
>    service sendmail status
> 
> You should see something like:
>   # service sendmail status
>    sendmail (pid 1142 1134) is running...
> 

Harry's work here is much better. :) I don't play much with mail, 
sendmail, etc. on my box. I did just yesterday for the first time to 
prove a point to an admin, while we were admist a NetSky/Bagel.J watch, 
that just stated to a curious user that said user should not open an 
email stating authority over our email services unless it was "from" one 
of us. I didn't think she knew it was so easy to forge email headers. As 
easy as:

# /usr/sbin/sendmail -f theprez at whitehouse.gov redhat-list at redhat.com < 
presMessage.txt

I digress.

Thanks Harry too for your earlier tip on bash aliases. :)

Tim