SIMPLE MAIL TRANSFER
PROTOCOL (SMTP)
McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000
Introduction
The actual mail transfer is done through message
transfer agents (MTAs). To send mail, a system must
have the client MTA, and to receive mail, a system
must have a server MTA. The formal protocol that
defines the MTA client and server in the Internet is
called Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP).
Two pairs of MTA client-server programs are used in
the most common situation (fourth scenario).
SMTP is used two times, between the sender and
the sender’s mail server and between the two mail
servers. Another protocol is needed between the
mail server and the receiver.
SMTP simply defines how commands and responses
must be sent back and forth. Each network is free to
choose a software package for implementation.
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SMTP uses commands and responses to transfer
messages between an MTA client and an MTA
server
Each command or reply is terminated by a two-
character (carriage return and line feed) end-of-
line token.
Commands are sent from the client to the server.
SMTP commands consists of a keyword followed
by zero or more arguments. SMTP defines 14
commands listed in next table.
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Responses are sent from the server to the client.
A response is a three-digit code that may be
followed by additional textual information.
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Mail transfer phases
The process of transferring a mail message occurs in
three phases: connection establishment, mail
transfer, and connection termination.
Connection Establishment
After a client has made a TCP connection to the well-
known port 25, the SMTP server starts the
connection phase. This phase involves the following
three steps, which are illustrated in next figure.
1. The server sends code 220 (service ready) to tell the
client that it is ready to receive mail. If the server is
not ready, it sends code 421 (service not available).
2. The client sends the HELO message to identify itself
using its domain name address. This step is
necessary to inform the server of the domain name
of the client.
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3. The server responds with code 250 (request
command completed) or some other code
depending on the situation.
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Message Transfer
After connection establishment, a single message
between a sender and one or more recipients can be
exchanged. This phase involves eight steps.
Steps 3 and 4 are repeated if there is more than one
recipient
1. The client sends the MAIL FROM message to
introduce the sender of the message. It includes the
mail address of the sender (mailbox and the domain
name).
2. The server responds with code 250 or some other
appropriate code.
3. The client sends the RCPT TO (recipient) message,
which includes the mail address of the recipient.
4. The server responds with code 250 or some other
appropriate code.
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5. The client sends the DATA message to initialize
the message transfer.
6. The server responds with code 354 (start mail
input) or some other appropriate message.
7. The client sends the contents of the message in
consecutive lines. Each line is terminated by a
two-character end-of-line token (carriage return
and line feed). The message is terminated by a
line containing just one period.
8. The server responds with code 250 (OK) or some
other appropriate code.
It is shown in next figure.
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Connection Termination
After the message is transferred successfully, the
client terminates the connection. This phase
involves two steps.
1. The client sends the QUIT command.
2. The server responds with code 221 or some other
appropriate code.
After the connection termination phase, the TCP
connection must be closed.
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POP3 & IMAP4
McGraw-Hill ©The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2000
MAA
The first and the second stages of mail delivery
use SMTP. However, SMTP is not involved in the
third stage because SMTP is a push protocol; it
pushes the message from the client to the server
The third stage needs a pull protocol; the client
must pull messages from the server. The direction
of the bulk data are from the server to the client.
The third stage uses a message access agent.
Currently two message access protocols are
available: Post Office Protocol, version 3 (POP3)
and Internet Mail Access Protocol, version 4
(IMAP4).
Figure next shows the position of these two
protocols in the most common situation (fourth
scenario). 12
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POP3
Post Office Protocol, version 3 (POP3) is simple and
limited in functionality. The client POP3 software is
installed on the recipient computer; the server
POP3 software is installed on the mail server.
Mail access starts with the client when the user
needs to download its e-mail from the mailbox on
the mail server. The client opens a connection to
the server on TCP port 110. It then sends its user
name and password to access the mailbox. The
user can then list and retrieve the mail messages,
one by one.
Figure next shows an example of downloading
using POP3.
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POP3 has two modes: the delete mode and the
keep mode.
In the delete mode, the mail is deleted from the
mailbox after each retrieval. In the keep mode,
the mail remains in the mailbox after retrieval.
The delete mode is normally used when the user
is working at his/her permanent computer and
can save and organize the received mail after
reading or replying. The keep mode is normally
used when the user accesses his/her mail away
from his/her primary computer.
The mail is read but kept in the system for later
retrieval and organizing.
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IMAP
Another mail access protocol is Internet Mail
Access Protocol, version 4 (IMAP4).
IMAP4 is similar to POP3, but it has more features;
IMAP4 is more powerful and more complex.
POP3 is deficient in several ways. It does not allow
the user to organize his/her mail on the server; the
user cannot have different folders on the server.
(Of course, the user can create folders on his/her
own computer.) In addition, POP3 does not allow
the user to partially check the contents of the mail
before downloading.
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IMAP4 provides the following extra functions:
❑ A user can check the e-mail header prior to
downloading.
❑ A user can search the contents of the e-mail for a
specific string of characters prior to downloading.
❑ A user can partially download e-mail. This is
especially useful if bandwidth is limited and the e-
mail contains multimedia with high bandwidth
requirements.
❑ A user can create, delete, or rename mailboxes
on the mail server.
❑ A user can create a hierarchy of mailboxes in a
folder for e-mail storage.
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MIME
E-mail has a simple structure. But it can send
messages only in NVT 7-bit ASCII format. It cannot be
used for languages other than English. Also it can’t
be used to send binary files or video or audio data.
Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME) is a
supplementary protocol that allows non-ASCII data to
be sent through e-mail.
MIME transforms non-ASCII data at the sender site to
NVT ASCII data & delivers it to the client MTA to be
sent through the Internet. The message at the
receiving site is transferred back to the original data.
MIME is a set of software functions that transforms
non-ASCII data & ASCII data & vice versa as show in
the figure.
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MIME defines 5 headers that can be added to the
original e-mail header section to define the
transformation parameters:
MIME version
Content type
Content transfer encoding
Content ID
Content description.
Following figure shows the MIME headers
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Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol
(DHCP)
Problems with BOOTP:
A serious problem with BOOTP is that it
requires manual configuration of tables
mapping IP address to Ethernet address.
When a new host is added to a LAN, it cannot use
BOOTP until an administrator has assigned it an IP
address and entered its (Ethernet address, IP
address) into the BOOTP configuration tables by
hand.
To eliminate this error-prone step, BOOTP was
extended and given a new name as DHCP (Dynamic
Host Configuration Protocol).
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Dynamic Host Configuration
Protocol (DHCP) …
BOOTP extended and given a new name as
Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) .
DHCP allows both manual IP address
assignment and automatic assignment. In most
systems, it has largely replaced RARP and BOOTP.
Like RARP and BOOTP, DHCP is based on the
idea of a special server that assigns IP
addresses to hosts asking for one. This server
need not be on the same LAN as the requesting
host. Since the DHCP server may not be reachable
by broadcasting, a DHCP relay agent is needed
on each LAN, as shown in Fig. 63.
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Dynamic Host Configuration
Protocol (DHCP) …
Operation of DHCP:
Fig. 63
Dynamic Host Configuration
Protocol (DHCP) …
1. To find its IP address, a newly-booted machine
broadcasts a DHCP DISCOVER packet.
2. The DHCP relay agent on its LAN intercepts all DHCP
broadcasts. When it finds a DHCP DISCOVER
packet, it sends the packet as a unicast packet
to the DHCP server, possibly on a distant network.
The only piece of information the relay agent needs is
the IP address of the DHCP server.
3. An issue that arises with automatic assignment of
IP addresses from a pool is how long an IP
address should be allocated.
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Dynamic Host Configuration
Protocol (DHCP) …
• If a host leaves the network and does not return its IP
address to the DHCP server, that address will be
permanently lost. After a period of time, many
addresses may be lost.
• To prevent that from happening, IP address
assignment may be for a fixed period of time, a
technique called leasing. Just before the lease
expires, the host must ask the DHCP for a
renewal. If it fails to make a request or the request is
denied, the host may no longer use the IP address it
was given earlier
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