SPF Records - mechanism not recognized by this client. unknown mechanisms:

Question

Having a bit of a problem with my hosting company rackspace cloud and SFP records. I asked them to updated it on there DNS. This is what they set it as:

seonky.com. 300 IN TXT "v=spf1 ip4:ubuntu a include:184.106.171.113 ?all"

However when I test it with gmail I get this:

Received-SPF: unknown (google.com: domain of [email protected] uses a mechanism not recognized by this client. unknown mechanisms: )) client-ip=184.106.171.113; Authentication-Results: mx.google.com; spf=permerror (google.com: domain of [email protected] uses a mechanism not recognized by this client. unknown mechanisms: )) [email protected] Received: from MFP2 (localhost [127.0.0.1])

Any idea what I should tell them so that they will fixe it and not ask me to go generate another SFP?

Solution

You're looking to tell Google that they need to change their SPF checking client to work with your record?

I don't want to sound harsh here, but the blame is not with them, and you do need a new SPF record.

The ip4 setting needs to be an IP address, and the include record needs to be a domain name. Not sure what you're intending with your record, but something like this may be what you want:

v=spf1 a ip4:184.106.171.113 ~all

See the documentation here for more info on what can go into these records.

Comments

[Levi]

I don't want Google to change, that would be silly. Just trying to sort out why it's not working. I'll give "v=spf1 a ip4:184.106.171.113 ~all" a try, then I'll go for "v=spf1 ip4:184.106.171.113 a include:seonky.com ?all" (correct??) if the mail keeps going into the spam box.

[ravi yarlagadda]

You wouldn't want to include the domain that the record's in. That would create an infinite loop - which I'm sure most checkers will account for, but may invalidate your record in some cases.