[Mailman-Developers] Mailman and Submission port

[Barry Warsaw]

On Nov 30, 2009, at 6:28 AM, Ian Eiloart wrote:

> Autoconfiguration shouldn't be too hard. Mailman has to be  
> configured with a hostname. There are three options for the port:
>
> custom configuration
> 587
> 25
>
> Mailman can test the connectivity of each in turn, on the first  
> message that it sends. Cache the port number on success. This should  
> be run-time autoconfiguration, not install time autoconfiguration.  
> That way, the configuration can cope with a change of host name. If  
> a port becomes unavailable, then alternate ports could be tested...
>
> Other mail clients do this, including Apple Mail and MS Outlook,  
> when configuring new accounts.
>
> Am I right in thinking that all the mail is typically routed through  
> a local MTA?

Yes.  I should also say that I think adding support for AUTH (via  
smtplib.SMTP.login()) is somewhat orthogonal to port selection.  We  
should do the former even if we change nothing about current port  
selection.

Here's a thought on the latter for anybody wishing to hack: extend the  
semantics of [mta]smtp_port in Mailman 3 to allow for a list of  
whitespace separated ports to try, and add a cache_lifetime  
parameter.  If int(config.mta.smtp_port) fails, try splitting the  
variable and int'ing the items.  In that case, try each port in order  
and remember the winner for cache_lifetime.  You don't need to keep  
the cached value in the db; it would be fine to throw it away and re- 
probe on outgoing queue restart.

In the new tradition of the 21st century: branches welcome. :)  If  
someone does want to contribute here, please make the AUTH support a  
separate branch from the port probe support.  I will be happy to  
review any such branches.

-Barry

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