found host? host not found?

[koji watanabe]

Hi!

amateur question...

We have a sparc-solaris8 box in named (8.1.2) and sendmail
(8.9.3).

Although we have to send e-mail to "name at domain.dom" everyday as
 a batch job, 
occasionally we find it haven't done.

We know the other party's MX record that we want to send to, 
that is "exchanger.domain.dom." 

The other party's zone record is ,

  =============================================================
  $ORIGIN  dom.
  domain	IN	SOA	exchange.domain.dom. postmaster...
  		IN	NS	exchanger.domain.dom.
  		IN	MX 10	exchanger.domain.dom.
  	
  $ORIGIN  domain.dom.
  
  exchanger	IN	A	192.168.10.10
  ==============================================================

we want to send e-mail to "EXCHANGER.DOMAIN.DOM".

according to sendmail log:

  =============================================================
  Nov 27 15:06:38 g-fw sendmail[16736]: [ID 801593 mail.info]
  BAA16730:   to=<name at domain.dom>, delay=00:00:00, 
  xdelay=00:00:00, mailer=smtp,   relay=exchanger.domain.dom., 
  stat=Host unknown (Name server: exchanger.domain.dom.
  : host not found)
  =============================================================

The quesion is ,

Sendmail did not know that "domain.dom" 's MX is 
"EXCHANGER.DOMAIN.DOM" as long as he made inquire to nameserver.
 Because this is available only in nameserver, he has no hosts
 entry in local.
 
 But sendmail has judged  "host not found" to the answer he got.
 why sendmail couldn't get IP address 

What happened?

That means he was acquire "EXCHANGER.DOMAIN.DOM" as MX, 
but he can't getA record of that?


==
Koji.Watanabe ( diet at ctc-g.co.jp)