222912 - SMTP fails intermittently using SSL through port 465. Workarounds only work intermittently.

Status: RESOLVED INVALID

(MailNews Core :: Networking: SMTP, defect)

Description

[Kenneth Irving]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win98; en-US; rv:1.5) Gecko/20031007
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Win98; en-US; rv:1.5) Gecko/20031007

This seems related to bugs 135357 & 98399, if it is not actually the same. Setup
for sending through the worldnet smtp server using SSL on port 465 did not work
initially. I noticed what seemed to be old Netscape account stuff in the prefs
(about:config), so deleted all accounts. When I set up a new account, SMTP
through 465 worked fine, and continued to work when I added another account.
Then, after I exited Mozilla and started it up again later, SMTP failed again. I
used a workaround (port 25, with all other settings remaining the same)
mentioned in regard to 98399 and it worked fine - until the next time I logged
on. Now the only thing that works is SMTP through a non-SSL server on port 25,
which essentially makes Mozilla mail useless at this point. Too bad, as I like
everything else about it. It seems to me like some settings are not stable, as I
also recall that when I started up the second account, SMTP failed initially,
but when I checked the settings, the "port" box was empty. I filled in 465 and
it worked for that session. It hasn't changed since then, but I have a feeling
that something in that long list of prefs that show up with about:config may have.

PS - When I say "SMTP failed," sending either produced an endless "sending,
sending . . . " progress box or (eventually) a message that the server was not
available. In each case, I would then send something through the "unavailable"
server using Pegasus Mail to see whether or not it was online. The settings
being used for SMTP in Mozilla Mail are those recommended by Worldnet and used
successfully in Pegasus Mail.

Reproducible: Didn't try

Steps to Reproduce:
I would love to work at this, but it would mean continually deleting and
resetting accounts to see what happened. That seems to be a central theme in
what's making it go wrong.

Comment 1

[Christian Eyrich]

Did you use the same Mozilla build for this mail work as when reporting this
bug? If so, this bug isn't related to bug 135357 because that patch in only in
the 1.6 trunk, not in any 1.5 build!

Your Mozilla shouldn't be able to use SSL on port 465. That it worked at least
for some time is what I'm surprised about.
It recommend to download 1.6a (currently only nightlies available) if you want
to use SSL on port 465.

BTW, having an empty port field is default for versions up to 1.5. It then uses
port 25.

Comment 2

[Thomas Hänig]

Hi, 
I tried to use the nightly build from 
http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/thunderbird/nightly/2003-10-08-1.5/thunderbird-i686-pc-linux-gtk2-gnu.tar.bz2 
 
and got similar "results". When trying to send via ssl it is impossible (whether I enter 
port 465 or not).  
 
The maillog shows the following: 
 
Oct 24 11:16:55 mail postfix/smtpd[1270]: starting TLS engine 
Oct 24 11:16:55 mail postfix/smtpd[1270]: setting up TLS connection from 
thomas[192.168.1.1] 
Oct 24 11:16:55 mail postfix/smtpd[1270]: SSL_accept:before/accept initialization 
Oct 24 11:16:55 mail postfix/smtpd[1270]: SSL_accept:error in SSLv2/v3 read client 
hello A 
 
During this I have a "Sending messge .. " window open w/o progress. 
When pressing cancel mailog continues as follows: 
 
Oct 24 11:17:15 mail postfix/smtpd[1270]: SSL_accept error from thomas[192.168.1.1]: 
-1 
 
Maybe this is of help for the direction to look for. 
 
Thomas 
 

Comment 3

[Christian Eyrich]

Äh, Thomas, the build you tested was 2003-10-08-1.5. And the 1.5 indicates it is
a build based on the 1.5 branch, which - as I wrote before - doesn't contain the
patch to make SSL encrypted SMTP connections work (see bug 135357).

You need a _trunk_ build newer 2003-10-01 (AFAIK no such Thunderbird available
yet, only Seamonkey).

Comment 4

[Kenneth Irving]

<<
------- Additional Comment #3 From Christian Eyrich  2003-10-24 04:39 -------

Äh, Thomas, the build you tested was 2003-10-08-1.5. And the 1.5 indicates it is
a build based on the 1.5 branch, which - as I wrote before - doesn't contain the
patch to make SSL encrypted SMTP connections work (see bug 135357).

You need a _trunk_ build newer 2003-10-01 (AFAIK no such Thunderbird available
yet, only Seamonkey).>>

So it seems. Since what is going on in the trunks and branches is confusing to
me, I'm sticking with the 1.5 I've got for the moment (and staying away from
buzilla so as not to bother folks with things like this) and have set up stunnel
to get what I need from it, which works just fine.

Ken Irving

Comment 5

[Christian Eyrich]

Closing this as invalid because 1.5 builds aren't supposed to support SSL for SMTP.