On 5/10/2009, Jim (Jim@themailshack.com) wrote:
Just wrapping up this thread, it was a firewall issue after all, unbeknownst to me, the mail server box itself had a firewall running, separate from the main firewall box protecting my LAN. For some reason at boot time the local firewall was blocking connections to dovecot, but after restarting dovecot, all was well. I've shut down the firewall on the local box, which should prevent this from happening again in the future.
A basic firewall is not resource intensive, and I always set one up on any box I administer... especially since I always use fail2ban to lock out brute force attackers (requires a firewall)...
I'd recommend re-enabling it and configuring it properly... not much effort, and is just one more layer of protection...
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Best regards,
Charles