Hello world, I am concerned about those log entries:
Aug 24 21:16:51 drought postfix/pickup[23165]: fatal: watchdog timeout Aug 24 21:16:52 drought postfix/master[4713]: warning: process /usr/libexec/postfix/pickup pid 23165 exit status 1 Aug 24 21:33:31 drought postfix/pickup[28467]: fatal: watchdog timeout Aug 24 21:33:32 drought postfix/master[4713]: warning: process /usr/libexec/postfix/pickup pid 28467 exit status 1 Aug 24 21:33:32 drought postfix/master[4713]: warning: /usr/libexec/postfix/pickup: bad command startup -- throttling Aug 24 21:51:11 drought postfix/pickup[32345]: fatal: watchdog timeout Aug 24 21:51:12 drought postfix/master[4713]: warning: process /usr/libexec/postfix/pickup pid 32345 exit status 1 Aug 24 21:51:12 drought postfix/master[4713]: warning: /usr/libexec/postfix/pickup: bad command startup -- throttling Aug 24 22:08:51 drought postfix/pickup[3699]: fatal: watchdog timeout Aug 24 22:08:52 drought postfix/master[4713]: warning: process /usr/libexec/postfix/pickup pid 3699 exit status 1 Aug 24 22:08:52 drought postfix/master[4713]: warning: /usr/libexec/postfix/pickup: bad command startup -- throttling Aug 24 22:26:31 drought postfix/pickup[6946]: fatal: watchdog timeout Aug 24 22:26:32 drought postfix/master[4713]: warning: process /usr/libexec/postfix/pickup pid 6946 exit status 1 Aug 24 22:26:32 drought postfix/master[4713]: warning: /usr/libexec/postfix/pickup: bad command startup -- throttling Aug 24 22:44:11 drought postfix/pickup[10805]: fatal: watchdog timeout Aug 24 22:44:12 drought postfix/master[4713]: warning: process /usr/libexec/postfix/pickup pid 10805 exit status 1 Aug 24 22:44:12 drought postfix/master[4713]: warning: /usr/libexec/postfix/pickup: bad command startup -- throttling If my reading of pickup.c is correct, the watchdog timeout for pickup isn't 1000s but $daemon_timeout (which we didn't change from the default 18000s). Either way, there is absolutely nothing in the logs, neither 1000s nor 18000s ago. I've checked the mail log (of course), the general system log and the kernel logfiles. The six messages were correctly delivered around 23:01:55-56, they were not sent to a large list defined in $alias_maps or $virtual_alias_maps, but to single recipients. There are no other error|warning|fatal messages in the whole mail log for that day. I'm open to suggestions on how to debug this further. The output of "postconf -n" can be found below. Stefan alias_database = hash:/etc/aliases alias_maps = hash:/etc/aliases command_directory = /usr/sbin config_directory = /etc/postfix daemon_directory = /usr/libexec/postfix data_directory = /var/lib/postfix debug_peer_level = 2 html_directory = no inet_interfaces = loopback-only inet_protocols = all mail_owner = postfix mailq_path = /usr/bin/mailq.postfix manpage_directory = /usr/share/man mydestination = $myhostname, localhost.$mydomain, localhost mydomain = example.com myhostname = drought.example.com newaliases_path = /usr/bin/newaliases.postfix queue_directory = /var/spool/postfix readme_directory = /usr/share/doc/postfix-2.5.6/README_FILES relayhost = demuc-srvex1ht-nlb.example.com sample_directory = /usr/share/doc/postfix-2.5.6/samples sendmail_path = /usr/sbin/sendmail.postfix setgid_group = postdrop smtp_tls_security_level = may unknown_local_recipient_reject_code = 550
