ok, this makes total sense...

the logs show that postfix does not get the email to process. So, i don't think it's postfix/main.cf -- at least it's configured just as redhat recommends to work with dovecot. i just looked at the firewall settings and by adding all of these ports: 25, 110, 143

i was able to get my mail client to quit reporting errors -- are there other ports that should be openned?

i also looked at dns, an MX record points to the server correctly and dig calls give the correct answers

i'm encouraged, but still stumped, any suggestions?

thanks steve

Noel Jones wrote:

On 3/28/07, carpenter@strongs.org <carpenter@strongs.org> wrote:

...

i'm running RHEL v 5 and 1.0-1.2.rc15 of dovecot and 2.3.3-2 of postfix. users can send mail to outside hosts, but can not receive them. i find no errors in the maillog -- i used a page from the redhat docs to configure postfix and dovecot so that they used the same mail directory... i think...

any ideas on how to debug and/or fix this would be greatly appreciated.

Does your maillog show postfix receiving mail and delivering it locally?

If no, you have some problem preventing you from receiving mail - could be postfix config, firewall, DNS, ISP ... but not related to dovecot.

If yes, then postfix log entries will show where it puts the local mail. Make sure dovecot is looking in the same place with "dovecot -n"