Science Mail Technical Update

Technical update for mail‑domain DNS administrators

What and why we are doing this

With the new setup we are renaming our mail‑component servers so that their names reflect the function they perform in the mail chain.

This change has no impact on end users, but it makes troubleshooting and future feature implementation easier because we can immediately identify the machine involved.

First step

We have renamed mx3 to inboundmx3. Because this is essentially only a DNS change, we have also updated all MX records we manage. Domains for which we provide mail but do not control the DNS must be updated by their own administrators.

Current records:

		IN	MX 5	mx1.science.ru.nl.
		IN	MX 5	mx2.science.ru.nl.
		IN	MX 5	mx3.science.ru.nl.

should be changed to

		IN	MX 5	mx1.science.ru.nl.
		IN	MX 5	mx2.science.ru.nl.
		IN	MX 5	inboundmx3.science.ru.nl.

What’s next

The next rename will probably take place next month. We are not doing everything at once because we have three MX records; if one fails, the next one is chosen automatically. After each change we will monitor the system, and only proceed when everything works as expected. This staged approach ensures that, even if a change introduces a problem, mail will still be delivered via the remaining two routes.