BAD outgoing mail bug in 4.2.2

[HVGS]

I have noticed random outgoing emails are failing with Unable to connect to the destination SMTP.
This is on our production 4.2.2 server.

So I have tested both 4.2.2 and 3.3.2 in a clean Windows 7 virtual machine.

The following issue ONLY occurs in 4.2.2

The outgoing mail queue is set to have lifetime of 180mins and resend delay of 10mins (the defaults).

If I create an outbound Windows firewall rule to block port 25, any outgoing emails are logged as Unable to connect to the destination SMTP and removed from the queue immediately.
i.e. They DO NOT honour the lifetime setting or resend delay.

This is not correct behavior and not how 3.3.2 works.

In 3.3.2 the message is held in the outgoing queue and when port 25 outbound is re-allowed, the outbound mail is correctly sent at the next resend interval.

So any outbound connectivity issues with 4.2.2 will result in instant message failure !!
The use of the firewall is used to simulate such issues.

Regards,
Phil
HVGSIT

[Code Crafters]

We did an update 4.1.2 to not retry delivery for permanent errors such as "email does not exist" when they will never succeed to be delivered. However, the logic we used was to only retry if any temporary errors (e.g. grey listing).

We have noticed a few scenarios such as your Internet is down temporarily etc. or the destination SMTP is down temporarily where emails should be retried and may not be. As such we will improve this logic in the next update to retry sending for temporary errors and also any errors that aren't SMTP permanent errors (5xx errors) including "could not connect to destination SMTP".

[HVGS]

Any idea as to when this update would be ready ?

Sorry to be inpatient but this is a critical issue for us I am guessing would be for a lot of users if they checked their log files.

We probably notice it more because with have over 1200 users on the server and do a lot of external bulk emails.

Regards,
Phil
HVGS IT

[Code Crafters]

Hopefully we can do an update by the end of this week.

If it's a real problem let us know if you want us to make version 4.1.1 available as a temporary fix as this was the last release before this change. Please see http://www.codecrafters.com/AbilityMail ... ateHistory for a full list of updates to check what you'll also be removing by moving back to this version.

[HVGS]

We are a school and currently on a semester break for 2 weeks.

So we can wait a week or so for a new version.

Thanks for the update.
Phil
HVGSIT

[Code Crafters]

OK no problem. We'll definitely get something released before the end of next week.

[Ikon]

PMFBI:

Code-Crafters: thank you for getting on this. It would be weird and frustrating to have emails seemingly randomly not get delivered to their destinations....

Phil: nice troubleshooting. Thanks for spotting the issue.

[HVGS]

Any update on the fix for this issue ?

Thanks
Phil

[Code Crafters]

The update is complete. We should be releasing this today.

[Code Crafters]

Ability Mail Server 4.2.3 has now been released which includes this bug fix.

Please see http://www.codecrafters.com/AbilityMail ... ateHistory for full details.

[HVGS]

Thanks for fixing this issue !

I have applied the update and tested firewalling off outbound smtp. Mail queue now honours the retry settings.

Thanks,
Phil

[Code Crafters]

Glad this is now fixed.

We changed the logic so that the only time Outgoing Mail is NOT retried is if ALL recipient failures are 5xx permanent errors.