198582 - UI stalls entirely if SMTP session stalls in greeting phase

Status: RESOLVED INCOMPLETE

(MailNews Core :: Networking: SMTP, defect)

Description

[Blu3]

If the SMTP session stalls in the startup/greeting phase, then the entire UI of
moz will hang.  I have a MILTER plugin for sendmail that will hang the
connection until the milter plugin is ready to process the transaction. 
Yesterday I forgot to re-enable it and mozilla promptly hung repeatedly when the
SMTP server was waiting for the milter plugin to react.

What env LOG variable is there to do a verbose log of mozilla's SMTP activity?

2003 03 18 05

Comment 1

[John L. Webber]

I've seen this bug, or a similar bug, on Win 98 SE, Mozilla 1.3 final. It
appeared suddenly yesterday evening -- sending a mail caused every Mozilla
window to hang (turn grey). Had to kill moz with  Ctl-Alt-Del. Happened again
repeatedly this morning, despite a reinstall, and despite deactivating Norton
Antivirus and Internet Security. I was able to send the mail with Eudora without
problem. I tried emptying my trash and compacting all folders, with no effect. 
POP3 is working. I have spam controls activated -- could there be a bizarre
interaction there? I'm also using 1.3 final at work on Suse Linux (8.0), and
haven't seen this behaviour yet. I had been running moz 1.3 at home since beta days.
If there's any log info I can gather to elucidate this bug, please let me know.  
I would recommend raising the priority of this bug to "critical" or "blocker" --
I will have to use another program to send mail until it's fixed.

Comment 2

[John L. Webber]

Some additional info -- the problem only seems to appear using a particular SMTP
server (mail.gmx.net). Using another account with another server I had no
problem sending mail -- also with Norton Anti-Virus outgoing mail check. Perhaps
my primary mail provider (gmx) has changed its SMTP server recently?

Here's the output from a terminal SMTP session with mail.gmx.net:

telnet 213.165.64.20 25
Trying 213.165.64.20...
Connected to 213.165.64.20.
Escape character is '^]'.
220 {mp013-rz3} GMX Mailservices ESMTP
HELO jentro.com
250 {mp013-rz3} GMX Mailservices
MAIL FROM <[e-mail]>
451 {mp013-rz3} Need to authenticate via POP3 first
quit
221 {mp013-rz3} GMX Mailservices
Connection closed by foreign host.

Could it be that the extra string in curled braces {mp013-rz3} is confusing the
Mozilla mailer? When I open a terminal to the mail server at work I don't see that.

Comment 3

[John L. Webber]

Another update - when I changed my SMTP settings to "Never use SSL" from "Use
SSL if available, that fixed the problem. It would seem that the GMX mail server
was barfing on those settings.

Comment 4

[Blu3]

Sounds about right.  My server runs SSL and I require SMTP AUTH to relay through
it (to send mail), so it looks like when an SSL session stalls or delays, it
does something to perm. break the UI requiring a restart.

Comment 5

[Andy Will]

Hi John, 

great job. I confirm your statement. I have exactly the same problems. Same
smtp-server (smtp.gmx.net). It really seems that GMX has changed their SMTP
server configuration in respect to SSL support.

Comment 6

[Blu3]

This is a kind of urgent plea for attention.  This bug affects any user that has
a slow link (dialup) or happens to run into a slow SMTP server.  (With below
qualifications too)

When I'm out roaming, mozilla mail is useless to me for sending email.  Once I
attempt to send, I have to kill mozilla and restart it.  That's really horrible.

If anyone is interested in debugging it, I can provide feedback and an account
to test it with.

Comment 7

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

still see this problem?

Comment 8

[Joshua Cranmer [:jcranmer]]

RESO INCO per lack of response to last question. If you feel this change was made in error, please respond to this bug with your reasons why.