Newbie to RT -- can't get RT to *send* mail

RT Users
1

Ok, it’s past 7 p.m. Friday here in France, it’s the first time
I’ve used mysql, RT or indeed any CGI programs whatsoever, it’s
the first time I post to this list, so the odds are really quite
overwhelming that I’m asking a stupid question. Still, here
goes.

I’ve installed RT, I believe correctly :slight_smile: and since I’m using
exim I applied the exim-specific info in contrib. So far so
good.

The mail I send to the address I’ve configured gets into the
database all right, as comments or correspondence. That part
seems to account for all the mail-related problems mentioned in
the FAQ or the mailing list archives.

My problem is that when I through the web interface click reply,
the mail doesn’t go out. It’s listed in the bug history as sent,
but the mail just simply isn’t. Nothing is mentioned in the mail
logs, not in exim’s logs nor in the old sendmail logs.

I’ve unchecked all the mail-related boxes on the queue-admin
page, because I don’t want to send mail in the cases given –
in short, no automatic mail whatsoever – but I do want to send
mail when I explicitly click Reply.

config.pm says (havn’t changed it any):

$mailprog = "/usr/lib/sendmail";
$mail_options = "-oi -t";

which seems OK since exim has taken some pains to understand
sendmail syntax. /usr/lib/sendmail is a symlink to the exim
executable.

When I su to the rt user and execute /usr/lib/sendmail -oi -t
my_address << EOF followed by a standard mail with From:,
etc.

No errors are listed in the apache logs. If I was missing
something so gross as the perl mail module (wassisname for
CPAN anyway?) I figure there should be a terrible error logged
somewhere, or that the cgi’s should cry server error… right?

The only reasonable thing I can think of is that I don’t have a
real FQDN hostname… just an [:alpha:] name with no dots. I’m
not on a network with DNS. Exim is smarthosted to send all mail
to an IP address, and I get my mail with fetchmail. I’ve told
apache that its ServerName is the IP address, and it seems happy
with that. I set --force at mysql_install_db, and hand-edited
files afterwards, with no apparent ill effects. In the RT queue
configuration, the mail alias is fully defined with an @.

Now what? I’d truss something, but I’m not quite sure what.

I’m mainly scared that for something as vital for me as a mail
there are no flashing red blinkenlichten saying there’s an error
somewhere. Am I missing an RT logfile somewhere?

Base system:
Debian Linux 2.2 (potato) with exim 3.12, netscape 4.76,
apache-perl Debian version: 1.3.9-13.1-1.21.20000309-1

Downloaded today:

RT 1.0.7
MySQL 3.23.31
Msql-Mysql-modules-1.2215

HAND everybody.

#include <std_disclaim.h> Lorens Kockum

2

| I’m mainly scared that for something as vital for me as a mail
| there are no flashing red blinkenlichten saying there’s an error
| somewhere. Am I missing an RT logfile somewhere?
±–>8

It will be in the Apache error log, but it won’t have actually committed
such a major error that Apache would have failed the CGI.

For errors like this, I find it useful to use Log::STDERR. The top of my
rtmux.pl looks like:

#!/usr/bin/perl -T
use Tie::STDERR ‘allbery@ece.cmu.edu’;

and Tie::STDERR reports all stderr output to me via mail (using a
relatively dumb interface, so it should hopefully work). You can change it
to log stderr in other ways if you don’t want to use (or don’t trust) mail.

(In some ways it would be better if RT required Tie::STDERR.)

brandon s. allbery [os/2][linux][solaris][japh] allbery@kf8nh.apk.net
system administrator [WAY too many hats] allbery@ece.cmu.edu
electrical and computer engineering KF8NH
carnegie mellon university [“better check the oblivious first” -ke6sls]

3

#!/usr/bin/perl -T
use Tie::STDERR ‘allbery@ece.cmu.edu’;

and Tie::STDERR reports all stderr output to me via mail (using a
relatively dumb interface, so it should hopefully work). You can change it
to log stderr in other ways if you don’t want to use (or don’t trust) mail.

(In some ways it would be better if RT required Tie::STDERR.)

RT2 uses Log::Dispatch which allows logging via a number of different methods,
including Email, Syslog and spooling to a file on disk. And it gives us
different levels of logging.

    -j

–
brandon s. allbery [os/2][linux][solaris][japh] allbery@kf8nh.apk.net
system administrator [WAY too many hats] allbery@ece.cmu.edu
electrical and computer engineering KF8NH
carnegie mellon university [“better check the oblivious first” -ke6sls]

rt-users mailing list
rt-users@lists.fsck.com
http://lists.fsck.com/mailman/listinfo/rt-users

jesse reed vincent – root@eruditorum.org – jesse@fsck.com
70EBAC90: 2A07 FC22 7DB4 42C1 9D71 0108 41A3 3FB3 70EB AC90

“Mary had a crypto key / She kept it in escrow
And everything that Mary said / The Feds were sure to know” – Sam Simpson

4

and Tie::STDERR reports all stderr output to me via mail

Good idea (I didn’t know how to go about that). Didn’t work.
Hmmm. For my specific definition of “work”, that is. So if
there’s no error produced, maybe everything is working as
designed?

Track, track (using Tie::STDERR to tag points of passage).

./lib/rt/database/manipulate.pm, function add_correspondence.

It seems that mail is not sent . . . to the e-mail address of
the person who is logged in and executes the request to send
mail. And since I’m testing, I was doing everything with the
same account.

Not sending mail to the person originating the mail seems the
right thing to do, of course, now that I think of it – but I’m
used to programs being dumber than that :wink:

Concerned that I might have missed it in the docs, I grepped
through them for “mail” and did not find anything of the kind
(hint, hint ;-).

So %RT RESOLVE.

Now I’m looking at juicy features in RT2 and wondering whether I
should try for it immediately :slight_smile:

#include <std_disclaim.h> Lorens Kockum