SMTP mail failing

[Stephen Daddona]

We have a problem with a user not being able to send VMSmail. I'm suspecting that it's related to the size of the file that she's trying to send - 7182 blocks. She can send other files ok. (She runs a program that sends the mail to herself, which is set to forward the mail to her Exchange email account.) I tried looking in a log file for any clues as to why it's failing, but no luck. I looked in TCPIP$SMTP_LOGFILE.LOG, but that doesn't have anything in it:
%%%%%%%%%%%% 5-JAN-2007 21:30:40.37 %%%%%%%%%%%%
%TCPIP-I-SMTP_LOGSUC, using log file SYS$SPECIFIC:[TCPIP$SMTP]TCPIP$SMTP_LOGFILE
.LOG

%%%%%%%%%%%% 5-JAN-2007 21:30:40.53 %%%%%%%%%%%%
%TCPIP-I-SMTP_SYMBRUN, symbiont is running the queue TCPIP$SMTP_ES40_01

(I would thikn that there would be more entries in the log file.)

Are there any other log files that I can look in? I also set the two SMTP queues to /retain=error but didn't get anything.

Thanks in advance!

[Steven Schweda]

It might help to see exactly how the mail is
being sent.

> She runs a program that sends the mail to
> herself, which is set to forward the mail
> to her Exchange email account.

I don't know, was that clear to you?

TCPIP SHOW VERSION

There are logical names to enable more SMTP
diagnostics. (All described in the manual.)

sysman disk show TCPIP$SMTP

[Hoff]

3.6 gigabytes? By SMTP mail? Really? Cool.

I'd probably have tried ftp or sftp for this. Or a DVD.

It would not surprise me that Exchange might bounce a 3.6 gigabyte file.

This is up in the size range where tools such as zip can potentially fail -- and I've seen some ftp tools head off into the weeds, too. Some clients accessing the Exchange server might well choke, too.

If the file is native to OpenVMS, there can also be issues around low-level record structures. Even sequential files can have differences.

What's the bounce message?

Do smaller file transfers work?

Did you check the logs on the Exchange server?

And it would not surprise me that some firewalls and some SMTP mail servers might see this as a DoS attack, and might well drop the file. This above and beyond firewalls that drop (or strip off) MAIL messages with specific types of file.

I'd try some approach other than MAIL. ftp or sftp or web-based download or other such.

Stephen Hoffman
HoffmanLabs

[Steven Schweda]

Hoff:

"7182 blocks" is how many bytes again?

It may be unusually big, but not crazy big.

[Stephen Daddona]

The file is 3.6 meg. Smaller files send ok. This used to work, but I'm not familiar with the history of this and how large the files were previously.

I just tried sending the file from my account, and it worked. This leads me to believe that it's a quota issue with the user's account.

[Hoff]

ok, so much for the magnitude of my math skills today.

[Stephen Daddona]

Thanks for the replies