How does internal email get to the SMTP client of a SharePoint server?

Question

I am trying to configure incoming email to a SharePoint 2010 list on Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1. I am trying to avoid involvement with Exchange or Active Directory. When I try to email the list using my company email, it bounces back with a 510 Error: Invalid Domain Address. So how does internal email get to the SMTP client of a SharePoint server? Am I missing a step, or is there something wrong in my configuration?

My environment

SharePoint machine name: SPTest2010
local domain name: AcmeInc
my company email addresses: [email protected]

Following these TechNet instructions for the Simple Scenario to enable incoming email to a SharePoint list:

Installed SMTP on my SharePoint server, which created a default SMTP Virtual Server. There is one domain listed: SPTest2010.AcmeInc.local and under Type, it says Local (Default). The drop directory is C:\inetpub\mailroot\Drop I've checked that Authentication is Anonymous Access. For Relay Restrictions, I've enabled relaying from any server by choosing All except the list below. I verified SMTP-In was enabled in Windows Firewall.

Started the SMTP service (Services.msc -> Found Simple Mail Transfer Protocol, changed start up type to automatic, started the service, restarted the server.)

And then...?

So at this point, should I be able to email my server and have an .eml file appear in the drop folder? Or is there a missing step?

I am sending from [email protected] to [email protected].

Does it matter that we do have an exchange server handling Acme.com emails?

If I look at the header of internal emails, it says received from Exchange.AcmeInc.local

We don't have an MX record set up, because it doesn't need to work for external addresses.

"If you are using Exchange Server and are routing e-mail internally in your organization, you must create a host (A) resource record in DNS Manager to associate DNS domain names of computers (or hosts) to their IP addresses."

Does this apply to the Simple Scenario I am trying to do, or only the Advanced Scenario? I don't know if that is set up or not. How can I find out? I tried nslookup -q=all AcmeInc.Local and it comes back with server unknown.

If I ping SPTest2010.AcmeInc.local, it resolves to the IP of SPTest2010. Does that mean anything?

I know we have internal DNS, but I have no direct access to it.

This blog says: "You cannot use your existing corporate email client to send emails to Sharepoint lists." Why?

(Note: You can ignore these questions if they are not relevant to how the email is supposed to get to the drop folder.)

Other Settings that shouldn't matter:

Set up incoming email settings in Central Admin

Enable sites on this server to receive e-mail? Yes
Settings mode: Automatic
Use the SharePoint Directory Management Service to create distribution groups and contacts? No
E-mail server display address: mylist @ SPTest2010.AcmeInc.local
Accept mail from all e-mail servers

Set up a picture library to accept incoming emails

Allow this list to receive e-mail? Yes
E-mail address: [email protected]
Save e-mail attachments? Yes
Save original e-mail? Yes
Save meeting invitations? No
E-mail security policy: Accept e-mail messages from any sender

Answer 1

if i understand you correct you want to show incomming emails into a sharepoint 2010 list?

you can try the following:

http://sharepointgeorge.com/2010/configuring-incoming-email-sharepoint-2010/

Email enable SharePoint 2010 lists

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/ff679958.aspx

Hope this helps

Answer 2

Salve! I wanted to set up email too, for my Sharepoint. In my configuration, I used hMailServer.

I realize you didn't mention hMailServer in your post, but I want to use it as an example because it represents a third-party mail server that is not Exchange, and has nothing (as you wished) to do with Active Directory.

I am going to assume you have followed enough tutorials about configuring sharepoint lists and about configuring your sharepoint farm for incoming email. The most elusive information about whole process, however, has, as you have discovered, to do with getting mail from the mail server to Sharepoint.

Now, for SMTP, which is outgoing mail, you HAVE to configure iis6 virtual smtp server, and make it point to your real mail server for the real smtp. Your real email server will still do all the email work, but the iis6 "virtual" server just interfaces it for Sharepoint (why Sharepoint can't do it directly, I'm not sure).

For incoming mail, Sharepoint doesn't really do email; that is, it doesn't receive mail, and doesn't tell the world that it can do so. All it does is look in a folder to see if any messages are there waiting for it. When someone sends an email to an address at your domain, it first goes to your DNS server, who in turn directs that message to your email server. If you want sharepoint to end up with the message, you need to configure your email server to place the sharepoint-destined messages into Sharepoint's drop folder.

There is a catch here, however. Apparently, Sharepoint won't pick up any messages you put in its drop folder unless they have headers for both x-sender and x-receiver. So your email server needs to be able to add those headers if they are not already there (complicated, I know!).

Another catch is this - in order for my Sharepoint list email addresses to be valid (that is, folks can send email to them), they have to be acceptable to the email server. That means that the email server must either accept all emails destined for that domain (regardless of whether they exist) into a catch-all address - OR - you configure an email account for each email-enabled Sharepoint list (which is what I do).

I have a thread in the hMailServer forum about this. hMailServer will allow you to write vbscripts to do extra things - you can script the email server.

Here is another link about configuring Sharepoint to use hMailServer, and one more about how to script hMailServer to add the x-headers.

Answer 3

Try http://www.cloud2050.com. It doesn't require server side configration.

Answer 4

Can you telnet to port 25 to confirm that the port is open? From the run line:

telnet servername 25

That should pop a window confirming a connection. If it just pops up and goes away then you aren't accepting connections on port 25 and you will have to look at whatever is blocking that.

Answer 5

try the following article. In his article it explains about how to use external smtp.

http://www.jppinto.com/2010/07/how-to-configure-iis-smtp-server-to-forward-emails-using-a-gmail-account/