We have recently faced problems to deliver messages from our listserv
(lists.aiesec.org) to many of our members (few thousands) who are using
a web based email service provided by chek.com (our members are using
domain aiese.net for their email accounts).

Technical support at chek.com says that: "LSMTP reportedly violates
RFC822 standard by terminating lines in the header and body with only
LF. As such, Qmail will reject the mail with status 451, with the
error body pointing to a site explaining the problem."
                                        (copied from full message that is
below)

I do not fully believe this because we are not facing similar problems
with any other web based email account provider. The only error message
related to this non-delivery that I am able to find from the delivery
errors states:

--> Error description:
Error-for:  ******@AIESEC.NET
Error-Code: 0
Error-Text: Message could not be delivered to mailer "AIESEC.NET" after 4.01
            day(s) and has been discarded.  The last connection ended with a
            status of "WSAECONNRESET".

Error-End:  One error reported.


What do you think might be the cause for our current problems with
delivering messages to mail1.chek.com? And how to fix this problem?

With regards,

        Matti Vainio
        AIESEC International


-----Original Message-----
From: Andrei Neimanis
Sent: 28 November 2000 00:21

As my tech folks look into our problem, they have discovered that
we are not blocking you in any way.  What they have learned is that
there is a "bad" LSMTP server on your end which is not allowing a
good connection to be made between our concerns.  As I understand
it, and let me take this opportunity to clearly state that I am not
a "tech guy", that the issue in question has to do with "bare lf."
I am forwarding you a quick explanation of bare lf.

Bare LFs are strictly forbidden by the IETF document
"draft-ietf-drums-msg-fmt-09.txt".  This supersedes RFC822 in
defining the valid format for mail sent via SMTP.

Section 2.1 states:

  "Messages are divided into lines of characters. A line is a series of
  characters that is delimited with the two characters carriage-return and
  line-feed; that is, the carriage return (CR) character (ASCII value 13)
  followed immediately by the line feed (LF) character (ASCII value 10).
  (The carriage-return/line-feed pair is usually written in this document
  as "CRLF".) Each line of characters MUST be limited to 998 characters,
  and SHOULD be limited to 78 characters, excluding the CRLF."

Section 2.3 states:

  "CR and LF MUST only occur together as CRLF; they MUST NOT appear
  independently in the body."

LSMTP reportedly violates this standard by terminating lines in the header
and body with only LF.  As such, Qmail will reject the mail with status 451,
with the error body pointing to a site explaining the problem.

This is likely the issue we are running into.  Whether Lsoft provides a fix
to make their list processing software complaint to the relevant standards
document is unknown to us.

If a further, or more detailed explanation is need, please contact me and
I will facilitate a conference call etc. to get this issue resolved.

Regards,
Andrei