Unexpected SPF record when using outgoing-only mail

[Robin]

I recently switched to using managed DNS for a domain. The domain in question is configured to use outbound-only mail via an external SMTP server, as I have mail already hosted elsewhere. Isn't it wrong that I got an SPF record automatically created for this domain, then?

[nebulon]

SPF records are for sending out emails, which is what you still do with outbound-only. So it is to be expected to have the outbound related records to avoid having transactional emails like password resets and notifications directly put in spam.

[Robin]

@nebulon Hmm, okay. Been way too long since I've looked at running an email setup, so I had no idea! Good to know.

There is still a bit of a problem, though, in that it seems like the record creation doesn't play very well with other existing SPF records. I had an existing SPF record for my main domain, so this meant I ended up with two of them when Cloudron pushed its one. I've now merged them together, so I guess I'm fine, so long as Cloudron doesn't try install it again...

Not sure if this can be a problem or not...

[girish]

@Robin Cloudron won't overwrite existing entries in SPF record. It will only add "a:my.domain.com" to the existing SPF.

[Robin]

@girish Hmm, that didn't match the behaviour I saw. I ended up with two separate SPF records in Hetzner. One that I had already set up from my own DNS setup, and one added from Cloudron - which didn't contain the content of my own record. Thankfully it wasn't difficult to fix, once I read up on it.