Tech Town, NC

I love Gmail. So, when I read that Gmail was bidding adieu to “on behalf of” I thought, great, I’ll never need to open Outlook again! Not so fast.

To get right down to it, the configuration of my email provider, Dotster does not allow me to get rid of “on behalf of.” Dotster does not use SSL or TLS security on email messages, therefore, Google will not allow me to send through my/Dotster’s SMTP servers. Dotster authenticates via simple username and password verification, but does not issue signing certificates for all their servers.

To make the disappointment worse, I spent the setup process feeling like a techie failure. I re-entered my username, verified my password, messed with port settings, checked and unchecked the “Always use a secure connection (SSL) when sending mail” box. Nothing. Every time I got some form of error message. Couldn’t reach server or check port configuration. Fortunately, one of the errors told me to relax, it was not my fault:

Server response: Google tried to deliver your message, but it was
rejected by the recipient domain. We recommend contacting the other
email provider for further information about the cause of this error.
The error that the other server returned was: 500 Remote server does
not support TLS (state 6). code(500)

Unfortunately, support for TLS or SSL is not an option, it is a requirement for using SMTP servers with Gmail. My iPhone email set up leaves it up to me. I understand and appreciate Google’s efforts to ensure the security of my emails, and Dotster certainly should (and likely will) implement SSL or TLS, but for now it would be nice to override Google’s setting and connect my Dotster email to Gmail anyway. I’m willing to risk a little security for the convenience of Gmail. But for now, it’s back to Outlook.

For more info, here is Google’s support on Gmail settings.