MX entry in DNS

[Barry Margolin]

In article <37DB7C34.55485B1F at gmx.de>, Thomas Ludwig  <mat02eh at gmx.de> wrote:
>I'm afraid, it's a stupid question... but:
>
>I know that the MX (Mail eXchange) entry points to mail-servers, e.g.
>servers offering smtp.
>But I don't know what the use of these entries is. Which program(s)
>use(s) it?
>It least our smtp-server doesn't need the MX entry (but needs a
>'mailhost'-entry).
>
>Could someone please enlighten me?

It's used by the mail delivery software at *other* sites, to know how to
send mail to your domain.

It's not required, an A (Address) record will also work.  MX records are
used when you want mail for a domain to go to a different host than the
address of the domain itself (e.g. if you want company.com to point to the
same address as www.company.com, but mail for user at company.com should go to
mail.company.com).

-- 
Barry Margolin, barmar at bbnplanet.com
GTE Internetworking, Powered by BBN, Burlington, MA
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