Periodic Fable

Today I learned how to solve outgoing email problems.

The problem: Email was coming into a new installation of Thunderbird but outgoing mail was throwing up an error message.

We checked:

• The details of the outgoing mail server
• The usernames and passwords of the relevant accounts
• The security requirements of the mail server
• The setup of Thunderbird connecting to the Internnet (no proxy or other strange setting being used)
• The appropriate details like reply-to are filled in correctly

What turned out to be the problem? Using a friend’s network whose ISP appears to block the use of port 25

Solution – use port 26!

This may help others in future if you have a strange outgoing email problem.