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Sending Email with OPS-COM

Sending email from OPS-COM is a key element of communicating with your clients.  This article offers information related to the setup of a mail sending domain on our preferred mail partner Mailgun

Simple SPF Security

Add the following to your SPF record (in DNS) to allow OPS-COM servers to send email on your domains behalf.

 ip4:209.217.117.82/32  include:_spf.mailgun.org 

Please note that this is only first line generalized security.  More details here  https://www.dmarcanalyzer.com/spf/

Communicating with Clients

One of the key features of your OperationsCommander installation is the ease of communicating with your clients.  This communication may be outgoing messages related to purchases, notifications and even as part of the appeals process.

Why Mailgun

We selected Mailgun as our preferred email partner due to the ease of use of their APIs and their long standing success in the email space.  That together with their tools to track and report on sent emails made them an ideal candidate for email management.

What to Expect Without Mailgun

Within the OPS-COM system configuration, reply-to email addresses can be recorded.  One such email might be parking@yourdomain.com such that any email receipts sent will appear to come from this email address.

Due to the email being sent from a non-yourdomain.com system, the email may be marked as spam or carry a "on behalf of" header to let the client know that the email was not sent from a yourdomain.com system.

With a few simple DNS updates, it is possible to recognize the Mailgun server as a valid email sender for yourdomain.com

Using your own API offers an even better level of service so that you can inspect emails sent by OPS-COM, and this is the recommended configuration

Why Do I See On Behalf Of in My Email

Visit https://help.mailgun.com/hc/en-us/articles/360012491394-Why-Do-I-See-On-Behalf-Of-in-My-Email- for more information

Subdomain on the OPS-COM account

This is the preferred method. We will supply the DNS update details.  Your system admin will just need to add the details to DNS.

OPS-COM staff can create a subdomain on our configuration to to allow clients to send email with proper DKIM signatures.

We will create the subdomain and pass the DNS details to the appropriate system administrator.

Your Own Mailgun Account

This method allows clients to manage their own Mailgun account.

You may create a new or use an existing Mailgun account.  Please send the associated API key to support@ops-com.com

API keys can be created and found in the Mailgun site under:   Domain settings  →  Sending API Keys

* To aid in technical support related to email please invite OPS-COM support (support@ops-com.com) as a Developer level user.

Integrating Mailgun to Your Installation

Within the OPS-COM administrative interface, select System Configuration → Third Party

*In the case of OPS-COM creating a subdomain, OPS-COM support will update these details.

 

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Using the General OPS-COM Mailgun Account

This setup will enable OperationsCommander to send email on behalf of your domain.  It will remove the "on behalf of" notation that may be seen in emails that are not setup properly.

Required DNS Records

  1. Please send a copy of your domain DKIM to OPS-COM support. please also include your domain 
  2. Add the following DNS records to your DNS server.
Type
Hostname
Value
Notes
TXT mg.<your domain> v=spf1 include:mailgun.org ~all This adds an SPF record for Mailgun
TXT smtp._domainkey.<your domain> your DKIM key The DKIM key used with your domain

SPF = Sender Policy Framework

DKIM = Domain Key Identified Mail

Optional DNS Records

Mailgun recommends adding these values even if only sending emails.

In our experience they are not needed as they are related to tracking and receiving emails.

At this time, we do not require the optional DNS records in our setup.