[OT] sendmail HELO

[Mark Nienberg]

Forgive the off-topic post.  It relates to MailScanner only in the tangential sense that it
relates to sendmail and the next version of SpamAssassin, as I get our DNS records
in order for SPF.

For messages from mail daemons, which don't use "envelope from", SPF resorts to
using the address given by the HELO of the sending machine.  So my questions are:

1. How can I test what my sendmail is using for its HELO when it sends mail?  Is it
the same name that is listed in the "Received:" headers?  Is it the same name that I
see when I telnet to port 25 on the server? Do I have to resort to an ethereal capture
or something?  I suspect it is using its own machine name, which is an internal name
that does not have a real DNS record.  I should probably correct that.  I could make it
match the name used in the MX record for our domain, for example.

2. If I have to correct it, is it done with a line like this?

define(`confDOMAIN_NAME', `mail.mydomain.com')dnl

3. Alternatively, I guess I could get our ISP to set up a DNS record for whatever
name that the machine is using.  Are there any implications one way or the other?

Thanks for any help.
--
Mark W. Nienberg, SE
Tipping Mar + associates
1906 Shattuck Ave, Berkeley, CA  94704
visit our website at http://www.tippingmar.com