SMTP: Not receiving emails but not error either

[jmeckley]

I am building an app that will email external addresses.

The server is setup to relay messages.
The SmtpServer is setup in my code.
The To, From, Subject and Message properties are populated.

When I click send I don't receive an error, but when I check the yahoo account that I am testing I don't receive the email. Is there somewhere I can check to see if the message left our server? Right now it seems as though they disappeared into cyberspace. When I step through the code the Send command is executed. Any Ideas?

Jason Meckley
Database Analyst
WITF

 

[AGIMA]

Are you using CDONTS? Are you using the SMTP built into IIS?

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[jmeckley]

SMTP built into IIS.

This morning when I came in I revceived all the emails I tried to send out stating that there was a delay in sending them. I'm not sure why there was a delay because the yahoo account was receiving other emails throughout the day.

Jason Meckley
Database Analyst
WITF

 

[AGIMA]

What is sounds like is that your SMTP server is not correctly configured.

On your server you should have a directory structure that the SMTP server uses (c:\Inetpub\mailroot), in there you will see a directory called drop. When you create a SMTP message using CDONTS it creates a text file (ie your message with headers) and drops it in this folder. Once your SMTP server see this is will then transfer the file to Queue and transmit. If the mail fails to be delivered it will put the file into badmail.

So with this in mind you have some way to determine what might be happening. For example if the file never moves from the Drop folder then you SMTP server has a big problem (Like its not even running), if the file gets to the queue then your servers working but your uplink (the mail server that you send to) is not configured. If the file gets to the badmail folder then everything is working correctly and it is an external problem like the uplink mail server is not working or you dont have permission to send off it.

Here are the steps your SMTP server performs:

Checks for new mail.
Moves mail in to queue.
Creates a connection with your uplink mails server (not directly to the end client say, yahoo.com). So you have to make sure that your outgoing mail server is correct and you have permission to relay off it.
Then sends the message if every thing is OK or sends the message to badmail if there was a problem.

Hows all that sound. Let me know if you have any problem and I am sure I can send you some configuration or access to a mail server that you can test on (ie relay to).



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AGIMA Computing

http://www.agima.com.au

 

[jmeckley]

Could it be based on user rights?

I have a windows service that sends out emails for another project and this is setup exactly the same way. But for some reason the service works, and my current web app does not.

Jason Meckley
Database Analyst
WITF

 

[jmeckley]

One other thing, if i email a domain email address it comes right through in seconds.

Jason Meckley
Database Analyst
WITF

 

[AGIMA]

As default everyone is allowed to send off the SMTP server, could however test this by changing the anyo user on the web site to be an admin user.

AGIMA - professional web hosting is our business.

AGIMA Computing

http://www.agima.com.au