The qpopper list archive ending on 21 Jan 2004


Topics covered in this issue include:

  1. Re: Messages downloading multiple times
       Joe Maimon <jmaimon at ttec dot com>
       Tue, 23 Dec 2003 08:53:48 -0500
  2. Re: Messages downloading multiple times
       Wayne Heming <wheming at hemnet.com dot au>
       Wed, 24 Dec 2003 09:42:41 +1100
  3. Re: Messages downloading multiple times
       Chuck Yerkes <chuck+qpopper at yerkes dot com>
       Tue, 23 Dec 2003 18:20:22 -0500
  4. 
       "Alan W. Rateliff, II" <lists at rateliff dot net>
       
  5. Re: Messages downloading multiple times
       Gregory Hicks <ghicks at cadence dot com>
       Tue, 23 Dec 2003 16:15:37 -0800 (PST)
  6. Re: Messages downloading multiple times
       Chuck Yerkes <chuck+qpopper at yerkes dot com>
       Tue, 23 Dec 2003 19:30:41 -0500
  7. Re: Messages downloading multiple times
       Chuck Yerkes <chuck+qpopper at yerkes dot com>
       Wed, 24 Dec 2003 13:22:02 -0500
  8. qpopper 4.0.5 emerged with Gentoo?
       Nickolas Ray Ellson <grimm at nickellson dot com>
       Sat, 27 Dec 2003 13:29:33 -0800 (PST)
  9. What are the steps for adding users
       rcarpent at cmp dot com
       Mon, 29 Dec 2003 18:08:53 -0500
 10. RE: What are the steps for adding users
       "Peter A. Solomon" <psolomon at adelphia dot net>
       Mon, 29 Dec 2003 23:32:25 -0500
 11. setting up a new QPopper server
       Patrick O'Neal <patrick at oneal dot net>
       Sun, 04 Jan 2004 21:12:54 -0600
 12. Re: setting up a new QPopper server
       "Paul" <paul at kbs.net dot au>
       Mon, 5 Jan 2004 14:26:17 +1100
 13. Re: setting up a new QPopper server
       "Kevin M. Barrett" <kmb at kmb dot com>
       Sun, 04 Jan 2004 23:06:05 -0500
 14. Re: setting up a new QPopper server
       Joe Maimon <jmaimon at ttec dot com>
       Sun, 04 Jan 2004 23:16:23 -0500
 15. Does qpopper support mbx mailbox format ?
       Rob Coates <rob at kissmurphy.com dot au>
       Tue, 6 Jan 2004 23:49:33 +1100
 16. Re: Does qpopper support mbx mailbox format ?
       Nickolas Ray Ellson <grimm at nickellson dot com>
       Tue, 6 Jan 2004 07:55:10 -0800 (PST)
 17. Re: Does qpopper support mbx mailbox format ?
       Kenneth Porter <shiva at sewingwitch dot com>
       Tue, 06 Jan 2004 08:17:49 -0800
 18. Re: setting up a new QPopper server
       Chuck Yerkes <chuck+qpopper at yerkes dot com>
       Tue, 6 Jan 2004 15:58:12 -0500
 19. qpopper, redhat and outlook express
       "Eric" <nyre at kiercorp dot com>
       Mon, 12 Jan 2004 08:36:54 -0700
 20. qpopper telenet test local vs net
       "Eric" <nyre at kiercorp dot com>
       Mon, 12 Jan 2004 10:01:08 -0700
 21. RE: qpopper telenet test local vs net
       "Peter A. Solomon" <psolomon at adelphia dot net>
       Mon, 12 Jan 2004 13:55:55 -0500
 22. --disable-status
       Jim Medley <jmedley at aesrg.tamu dot edu>
       Mon, 12 Jan 2004 11:24:06 -0600
 23. qpopper openSSL "ERR POP EOF or I/O Error"
       "Willem van den Berge" <wvandenberge at altep dot com>
       Mon, 12 Jan 2004 15:52:29 -0700
 24. Re: qpopper, redhat and outlook express
       Chuck Yerkes <chuck+qpopper at yerkes dot com>
       Mon, 12 Jan 2004 15:07:22 -0500
 25. Re: qpopper telenet test local vs net
       "Derek C." <coffee at blarg dot net>
       Wed, 14 Jan 2004 21:50:32 -0800
 26. Re: qpopper telenet test local vs net
       "Derek C." <coffee at blarg dot net>
       Thu, 15 Jan 2004 00:25:17 -0800
 27. latest gcc but all hosts = 0.0.0.0
       Hugh Sasse Staff Elec Eng <hgs at dmu.ac dot uk>
       Thu, 15 Jan 2004 11:59:29 +0000 (WET)
 28. startup scripts or pid of qpopper?
       Harald Kapper <hk at kapper dot net>
       Sun, 18 Jan 2004 21:48:49 +0100
 29. qpopper high load average
       Bart Dumon <bart at crossbar dot net>
       Mon, 19 Jan 2004 15:47:38 +0100
 30. Re: [spam] qpopper telenet test local vs net
       rcarpent at cmp dot com
       Mon, 19 Jan 2004 12:49:31 -0500
 31. Re: qpopper high load average
       The Little Prince <thelittleprince at asteroid-b612 dot org>
       Mon, 19 Jan 2004 09:58:26 -0800 (PST)
 32. Re: qpopper high load average
       Alan Brown <alanb at digistar dot com>
       Mon, 19 Jan 2004 13:17:25 -0500 (EST)
 33. Re: qpopper high load average
       Bart Dumon <bart at crossbar dot net>
       Mon, 19 Jan 2004 19:50:16 +0100
 34. Re: qpopper high load average
       Bart Dumon <bart at crossbar dot net>
       Mon, 19 Jan 2004 19:49:19 +0100
 35. Re: qpopper high load average
       Ken Rossman <rossman at columbia dot edu>
       Mon, 19 Jan 2004 14:19:22 -0500
 36. Re: qpopper high load average
       Clifton Royston <cliftonr at lava dot net>
       Tue, 20 Jan 2004 13:16:53 -1000
 37. setting up a new QPopper server
       Patrick O'Neal <patrick at oneal dot net>
       Tue, 20 Jan 2004 17:25:52 -0600
 38. Re: qpopper high load average
       The Little Prince <thelittleprince at asteroid-b612 dot org>
       Tue, 20 Jan 2004 15:45:49 -0800 (PST)
 39. Re: setting up a new QPopper server
       The Little Prince <thelittleprince at asteroid-b612 dot org>
       Tue, 20 Jan 2004 16:12:30 -0800 (PST)
 40. Load Average - Qpopper
       "Louis A. DeRobertis" <louis at suffolk.lib.ny dot us>
       Tue, 20 Jan 2004 19:42:48 -0500 (EST)
 41. Re: qpopper high load average
       "Paul" <paul at kbs.net dot au>
       Wed, 21 Jan 2004 11:24:12 +1100
 42. Re: Load Average - Qpopper
       The Little Prince <thelittleprince at asteroid-b612 dot org>
       Tue, 20 Jan 2004 17:32:49 -0800 (PST)
 43. Re: Load Average - Qpopper
       Chuck Yerkes <chuck+qpopper at yerkes dot com>
       Tue, 20 Jan 2004 17:36:02 -0800
 44. Re: setting up a new QPopper server
       "Paul" <paul at kbs.net dot au>
       Wed, 21 Jan 2004 11:13:53 +1100
 45. 
       "Eric" <nyre at kiercorp dot com>
       Wed, 21 Jan 2004 13:33:03 -0700
 46. qpopper and tcpdump110
       "Eric" <nyre at kiercorp dot com>
       Wed, 21 Jan 2004 13:33:46 -0700
 47. Re: qpopper high load average
       Bart Dumon <bart at crossbar dot net>
       Wed, 21 Jan 2004 22:41:23 +0100
 48. Re: qpopper high load average
       Bart Dumon <bart at crossbar dot net>
       Wed, 21 Jan 2004 22:45:20 +0100
 49. Re: qpopper high load average
       Bart Dumon <bart at crossbar dot net>
       Wed, 21 Jan 2004 22:44:18 +0100
 50. Re: qpopper high load average
       David Champion <dgc at uchicago dot edu>
       Wed, 21 Jan 2004 17:09:31 -0600

Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2003 08:53:48 -0500
From: Joe Maimon <jmaimon at ttec dot com>
Subject: Re: Messages downloading multiple times



Alan Brown wrote:

>On Tue, 23 Dec 2003, Wayne Heming wrote:
>
>  
>
>>It then returns an error to the sender saying that a mailbox is full and it
>>will retry sending for 4 days.
>>
>>    
>>
To the best of my recollection the default is 5 days.

>>sendmail then sends the message to all addressees and continues to do so
>>until it is successfully delivered to all addressees.
>>    
>>
I have never seen this behavior in any of my sendmails. I think it is 
safe to say this is a red herring.

>
>Uh..... That should NEVER happen.
>
>Sendmail keeps track of sucessful and unsucessful deliveries. If you're
>seeing this behaviour then something is really badly broken.
>
>
>
>  
>


Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2003 09:42:41 +1100
From: Wayne Heming <wheming at hemnet.com dot au>
Subject: Re: Messages downloading multiple times

You may think its broken or a red herring, but I think you may have missed 
a point.

This is exactly how sendmail operates, and yes it may be 5 days instead of 
4. If there is a way around it I would like to know, but a lot of "so 
called" sendmail gurus have looked and think it is correct.

The main point is that the message is sent to the users on the same domain 
from a user of that domain and the mailbox has to be over quota, lets face 
it, this doesn't happen that often.

I was just offering another scenario where someone receives multiple copies 
of the same message. I have only seen it once, and it was one of the users 
with an empty box that complained about it.

Wayne


At 12:53 AM 24/12/2003, Joe Maimon wrote:


>Alan Brown wrote:
>
>>On Tue, 23 Dec 2003, Wayne Heming wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>>It then returns an error to the sender saying that a mailbox is full and it
>>>will retry sending for 4 days.
>>>
>>>
>To the best of my recollection the default is 5 days.
>
>>>sendmail then sends the message to all addressees and continues to do so
>>>until it is successfully delivered to all addressees.
>>>
>I have never seen this behavior in any of my sendmails. I think it is safe 
>to say this is a red herring.
>
>>
>>Uh..... That should NEVER happen.
>>
>>Sendmail keeps track of sucessful and unsucessful deliveries. If you're
>>seeing this behaviour then something is really badly broken.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>


Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2003 18:20:22 -0500
From: Chuck Yerkes <chuck+qpopper at yerkes dot com>
Subject: Re: Messages downloading multiple times

369 at lists.pensive.org> <369400198415707385904 at lists dot pensive dot org>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Disposition: inline
In-Reply-To: <369400198415707385904 at lists.pensive dot org>
User-Agent: Mutt/1.4i
X-Spam-Status: No, hits=-4.9 required=5.0 testsºYES_00 autolearn=ham 
	version=2.60
X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 2.60 (1.212-2003-09-23-exp) on 
	crusoe.degler.net

I might be one of those sendmail gurus (unconsulted on this)...

Quoting Wayne Heming (wheming at hemnet.com dot au):
> You may think its broken or a red herring, but I think you may have missed 
> a point.
> 
> This is exactly how sendmail operates, and yes it may be 5 days instead of 
> 4. If there is a way around it I would like to know, but a lot of "so 
> called" sendmail gurus have looked and think it is correct.


No, it's how the delivery agent operates.  Basically sendmail is told it
can use this mailer for multiple users.  It gets back a non-success
code (75 says requeue, try later).

Roughly:  Mr /bin/mail, here is mail for "FineUser" and "FullUser"
And /bin/mail returns  "Ahhh, badness.  requeue" (aka return(EX_TEMPFAIL)
aka return(75)).  Sendmail only sees a return value to the program.


The solution to this is to use LMTP to deliver.  procmail speaks
SMTP, AFAIK, as can most mail.locals (and cyrus deliver and others).
Basically it's like SMTP but with fewer options (and over a unix
domain socket).

Mail to: fineUser 
OK
Mail To: FullUser
Error, over quota

fineUser will be removed from the list, FullUser will remain.


Sendmail doesn't actually deliver local mail.  It uses agents.
That's why it was renamed from "delivermail" in 1981 or so.  If those
agents are a bit stupid, then it's got little choice in the matter.

LMTP is a good answer.

From: "Alan W. Rateliff, II" <lists at rateliff dot net>

369 at lists.pensive.org> <369400198415707385904 at lists dot pensive dot org>
Subject: Re: Messages downloading multiple times
Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2003 18:20:46 -0500
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
X-Priority: 3
X-MSMail-Priority: Normal
X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 6.00.2800.1158
X-MIMEOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V6.00.2800.1165

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Wayne Heming" <wheming at hemnet.com dot au>
To: "Subscribers of Qpopper" <qpopper at lists.pensive dot org>
Sent: Tuesday, December 23, 2003 5:42 PM
Subject: Re: Messages downloading multiple times


> This is exactly how sendmail operates, and yes it may be 5 days instead of
> 4. If there is a way around it I would like to know, but a lot of "so
> called" sendmail gurus have looked and think it is correct.
>
> The main point is that the message is sent to the users on the same domain
> from a user of that domain and the mailbox has to be over quota, lets face
> it, this doesn't happen that often.

If this is a vanilla installation of Sendmail, and not some OEM incarnation,
then you should report this to Sendmail and see what Claus says about it.
The quickest way to get an answer is to report to comp.mail.sendmail.

If it is some OEM version, you should contact the vendor for a fix.  I have
never seen this behavior in sendmail on other systems configured to
reattempt delivery.  Admittedly, on my systems Procmail rejects the message
for over-quota boxes, and Sendmail returns it to sender.

As for the original problem of this thread, can anyone tell me WHY oh WHY
"modern" email programs download the same messages over and over?  I ask
this because when I exists in my sheltered world of Amiga I never
experienced this problem; YAM kept track of UIDLs and would skip over
messages which it had already downloaded.  I became exposed to this
phenomenon when I began working for an ISP several years back, supporting
Lookout Express and Nutscrape.

-- 
       Alan W. Rateliff, II        :       RATELIFF.NET
 Independent Technology Consultant :    alan2 at rateliff dot net
      (Office) 850/350-0260        :  (Mobile) 850/559-0100
-------------------------------------------------------------
[System Administration][IT Consulting][Computer Sales/Repair]



Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2003 16:15:37 -0800 (PST)
From: Gregory Hicks <ghicks at cadence dot com>
Subject: Re: Messages downloading multiple times


> Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2003 09:42:41 +1100
> From: Wayne Heming <wheming at hemnet.com dot au>
> 
[...snip...]
> 
> This is exactly how sendmail operates, and yes it may be 5 days
> instead of 4. If there is a way around it I would like to know, but a
> lot of "so called" sendmail gurus have looked and think it is correct.
>

We are going a bit far a field, but...

If the receipt of a message puts a user "over-quota" (hard quota), the
file system is not supposed to let the message get written to disk.  It
returns an error that indicates "over-quota".  The RECEIVING sendmail
is uspposed to return a 4.x.x error code (indicates a temporary
error).

The SENDING sendmail will continue to try to deliver the mail until the
queue timeout, normally 5 days (but I've seen exchange servers set as
low as 4 hours...).  At that time the maill is returned as
undeliverable to the originator.

[...snip...]
> 
> I was just offering another scenario where someone receives multiple
> copies of the same message. I have only seen it once, and it was one
> of the users with an empty box that complained about it.

The majority of these multiple delivery scenarios turns out to be a
client side problem in that it cannot decipher what popper is sending.
It will receive the message anyway, but will not mark it for deletion.
Thus popper keeps trying to resend.  Use pine os some such MUA to
delete the message in question.  (I have, upon occassion, used vi
directly on the spool to delete the message - AFTER LOCKING IT FIRST
though...)

I HAVE seen instances (perhaps 4 over the past 8 years) where the
RECEIVING sendmail just "hangs up" on the SENDING sendmail before the
message receipt is properly acknowledged to the sender.  Thus the
SENDING sendmail keeps trying to deliver the mail.

This last case, however, will show up in the system logs whereas the
client issue will not.

(I think I have the above correct...)

Regards,
Gregory Hicks

> 
> Wayne
> 
> 
> At 12:53 AM 24/12/2003, Joe Maimon wrote:
> 
> 
> >Alan Brown wrote:
> >
> >>On Tue, 23 Dec 2003, Wayne Heming wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>>It then returns an error to the sender saying that a mailbox is 
full and it
> >>>will retry sending for 4 days.
> >>>
> >>>
> >To the best of my recollection the default is 5 days.
> >
> >>>sendmail then sends the message to all addressees and continues to 
do so
> >>>until it is successfully delivered to all addressees.
> >>>
[...snip...]

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Gregory Hicks                           | Principal Systems Engineer
Cadence Design Systems                  | Direct:   408.576.3609
555 River Oaks Pkwy M/S 6B1             | Fax:      408.894.3479
San Jose, CA 95134                      | Internet: ghicks at cadence dot com

Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by
ignorance or stupidity.

Asking the wrong questions is the leading cause of wrong answers

"The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they
be properly armed." --Alexander Hamilton


Date: Tue, 23 Dec 2003 19:30:41 -0500
From: Chuck Yerkes <chuck+qpopper at yerkes dot com>
Subject: Re: Messages downloading multiple times

Again, it's the LDA, not sendmail.  If there's a problem,
it's not sendmail's problem.  Sendmail is doing what it's told.

Claus might offer a simple:
 "Perhaps you should use an LDA which is not broken."

Quoting Wayne Heming (wheming at hemnet.com dot au):
> You may think its broken or a red herring, but I think you may have missed 
> a point.
> 
> This is exactly how sendmail operates, and yes it may be 5 days instead of 
> 4. If there is a way around it I would like to know, but a lot of "so 
> called" sendmail gurus have looked and think it is correct.
> 
> The main point is that the message is sent to the users on the same domain 
> from a user of that domain and the mailbox has to be over quota, lets face 
> it, this doesn't happen that often.
> 
> I was just offering another scenario where someone receives multiple copies 
> of the same message. I have only seen it once, and it was one of the users 
> with an empty box that complained about it.

Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2003 13:22:02 -0500
From: Chuck Yerkes <chuck+qpopper at yerkes dot com>
Subject: Re: Messages downloading multiple times

Quoting Gregory Hicks (ghicks at cadence dot com):
> 
> > Date: Wed, 24 Dec 2003 09:42:41 +1100
> > From: Wayne Heming <wheming at hemnet.com dot au>
> [...snip...]
> > This is exactly how sendmail operates, and yes it may be 5 days
> > instead of 4. If there is a way around it I would like to know, but a
> > lot of "so called" sendmail gurus have looked and think it is correct.
> 
> We are going a bit far a field, but...
> 
> If the receipt of a message puts a user "over-quota" (hard quota), the
> file system is not supposed to let the message get written to disk.  It
> returns an error that indicates "over-quota".  The RECEIVING sendmail
> is uspposed to return a 4.x.x error code (indicates a temporary
> error).

Sometimes.  Lots of ISPs and sites want over-quota to issue a PERM
FAIL.  And my experience is that I've gotten a lot of 5.x.x bounces
back because someone is overquota.  There are several rationals
for perm fail; I don't like any of them, but then, I don't like
spam and mail bombs.

> The SENDING sendmail will continue to try to deliver the mail until the
> queue timeout, normally 5 days (but I've seen exchange servers set as
> low as 4 hours...).  At that time the maill is returned as
> undeliverable to the originator.

I believe that's against RFCs (or likely a SHOULD rather than a MUST),
but then, "Microsoft doesn't follow standards, [they] set them!"

Date: Sat, 27 Dec 2003 13:29:33 -0800 (PST)
From: Nickolas Ray Ellson <grimm at nickellson dot com>
Subject: qpopper 4.0.5 emerged with Gentoo?

Hi,

I am hoping someone here has installed or "emerged" qpopper in Gentoo 
Linux.

I have used this product in RedHat with no issues, but all I get is 

Dec 27 12:16:41 goonie popper[28291]: Unable to obtain socket and address 
of client: Socket operation on non-socket (88)

when I try to start "popper -d -S"

I can see that the ebuild file is enabling debugging.. but this is all I 
get.

Can anyone help point me a way to get more logging? Or is this error 
enough to point to a problem? (I have disables the xinetd.d pop-3 file so 
it doesn't interfer.

Nick
 


Subject: What are the steps for adding users
From: rcarpent at cmp dot com
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2003 18:08:53 -0500

I am on a solaris 9 system running version 4.0. What are the steps for adding a
user.



******************************************************************************
Rob J. Carpenter
CMP Media LLC
Data Center 4th Floor
600 Community Drive
Manhasset, New York, NY 11030
E-Mail: rcarpent at cmp dot com / robjcarpenter at yahoo dot com
Phone:  516-562-5907   Cell: 516-532-2951 Pager:  516-372-4576
Quote:  The needs of the many out weigh the needs of the
                few or the one.

******************************************************************************



__________________________________________________________________________________________

Any views or opinions are solely those of the author and do not necessarily
represent those of CMP Media.

The information transmitted is intended only for the person or entity to which
it is addressed and may contain confidential and/or privileged material.  If you
are not the intended recipient of this message please do not read, copy, use or
disclose this communication and notify the sender immediately.  It should be
noted that any review, retransmission, dissemination or other use of, or taking
action or reliance upon, this information by persons or entities other than the
intended recipient is prohibited.
__________________________________________________________________________________________


From: "Peter A. Solomon" <psolomon at adelphia dot net>
Subject: RE: What are the steps for adding users
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2003 23:32:25 -0500

What authentication method?

> -----Original Message-----
> From: rcarpent at cmp dot com [mailto:rcarpent at cmp dot com] 
> Sent: Monday, December 29, 2003 6:09 PM
> To: Subscribers of Qpopper
> Subject: What are the steps for adding users
> 
> 
> I am on a solaris 9 system running version 4.0. What are the 
> steps for adding a
> user.
> 
> 
> 
> **************************************************************
> ****************
> Rob J. Carpenter
> CMP Media LLC
> Data Center 4th Floor
> 600 Community Drive
> Manhasset, New York, NY 11030
> E-Mail: rcarpent at cmp dot com / robjcarpenter at yahoo dot com
> Phone:  516-562-5907   Cell: 516-532-2951 Pager:  516-372-4576
> Quote:  The needs of the many out weigh the needs of the
>                 few or the one.
> 
> **************************************************************
> ****************
> 
> 
> 
> ______________________________________________________________
> ____________________________
> 
> Any views or opinions are solely those of the author and do 
> not necessarily
> represent those of CMP Media.
> 
> The information transmitted is intended only for the person 
> or entity to which
> it is addressed and may contain confidential and/or 
> privileged material.  If you
> are not the intended recipient of this message please do not 
> read, copy, use or
> disclose this communication and notify the sender 
> immediately.  It should be
> noted that any review, retransmission, dissemination or other 
> use of, or taking
> action or reliance upon, this information by persons or 
> entities other than the
> intended recipient is prohibited.
> ______________________________________________________________
> ____________________________
> 
> 


Subject: setting up a new QPopper server
From: Patrick O'Neal <patrick at oneal dot net>
Date: Sun, 04 Jan 2004 21:12:54 -0600

Hi all,

I am looking at setting up qpopper on a Gentoo based Linux system Kernel
2.4.X. I have never setup qpopper before and after looking at the
QPopper manual I see a lot of things but no actuall help. What I am
looking at doing is the following:

1. Setup a POP3 server for about 10-20 users.
2. Hopefully use SSL or APOP<all I have read says that MS Outlook can't
authenticate with APOP, is this true?
3. Allow a web interface for users to check there email as well.
4. I don't need digests right now but it might be cool in the future.
5. Set up sendmail so that only my users can use it. NO RELAYING!< I
have found some info on this, but I am sure there is more somewhere.
6. Get some sleep at night! 

I have never setup POP3, I have set up an Exchange server, but I really
don't want to really on MS at all if I can help it! Any help,
suggestions would be great!

Patrick O'Neal


From: "Paul" <paul at kbs.net dot au>
Subject: Re: setting up a new QPopper server
Date: Mon, 5 Jan 2004 14:26:17 +1100


Hi Patrick,

Just some ideas, hope it helps :)

> 1. Setup a POP3 server for about 10-20 users.
Easily done. Qpopper can auth off the passwd file in linux (/etc/passwd).
Qpopper will support this out of the box

> 2. Hopefully use SSL or APOP<all I have read says that MS Outlook can't
> authenticate with APOP, is this true?
Not sure. Do you have a specific use for encryption? Most sites just use
POP3, however if you have a specific there may be a patch work around. Im
sure there are lots of people who use qpopper + apop + outlook

> 3. Allow a web interface for users to check there email as well.
Easy. Lots of php and perl webmails can be found at www.sourceforget.net

> 4. I don't need digests right now but it might be cool in the future.
Not sure regarding this one

> 5. Set up sendmail so that only my users can use it. NO RELAYING!< I
> have found some info on this, but I am sure there is more somewhere.
You can go that path, however I prefer exim. Its a direct replacement of
sendmail and can be installed over the top and still function as a fake
"sendamil" but provide many more features and configurable features. Much
easier than sendmail

> 6. Get some sleep at night!
This is good too

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Patrick O'Neal" <patrick at oneal dot net>
To: "Subscribers of Qpopper" <qpopper at lists.pensive dot org>
Sent: Monday, January 05, 2004 2:12 PM
Subject: setting up a new QPopper server


> Hi all,
>
> I am looking at setting up qpopper on a Gentoo based Linux system Kernel
> 2.4.X. I have never setup qpopper before and after looking at the
> QPopper manual I see a lot of things but no actuall help. What I am
> looking at doing is the following:
>
> 1. Setup a POP3 server for about 10-20 users.
> 2. Hopefully use SSL or APOP<all I have read says that MS Outlook can't
> authenticate with APOP, is this true?
> 3. Allow a web interface for users to check there email as well.
> 4. I don't need digests right now but it might be cool in the future.
> 5. Set up sendmail so that only my users can use it. NO RELAYING!< I
> have found some info on this, but I am sure there is more somewhere.
> 6. Get some sleep at night!
>
> I have never setup POP3, I have set up an Exchange server, but I really
> don't want to really on MS at all if I can help it! Any help,
> suggestions would be great!
>
> Patrick O'Neal
>
>


Date: Sun, 04 Jan 2004 23:06:05 -0500
From: "Kevin M. Barrett" <kmb at kmb dot com>
Subject: Re: setting up a new QPopper server

Patrick,

  #1)     Qpopper is not that difficult to build really,  I am not familiar 
with GenToo except by name,  But as long as you have all the required Libs 
available run configure and make see what comes out.  Look closely at the 
config.log file to be sure what paths are set to and if the defaults are 
not good for you rerun the configure command with the corrected commands 
overriding the defaults.

#2) SSL does work but I do not use it at this point. my users only have 
access to the mail server and nothing else, I personally use ssh to access 
the mail server for pop.  Can not help you with APOP

#3 Most web based email programs are imap not pop Squirrelmail comes to 
mind very functional.

#4 by digests I assume you are talking about mailing list digests, way off 
topic for this list.

#5 Sendmail - Again off topic but - I use exim as a direct replacement for 
Sendmail.  Fast and easy to maintain. very active and mostly friendly user 
group too.

#6 Sleep ... Ha! If you find some let me know where to get it ...





Kevin M. Barrett

KMB IT Consulting, Inc
http://www.exim-users.org/  Exim users group/forums  


Date: Sun, 04 Jan 2004 23:16:23 -0500
From: Joe Maimon <jmaimon at ttec dot com>
Subject: Re: setting up a new QPopper server

Patrick O'Neal wrote:

>Hi all,
>
>I am looking at setting up qpopper on a Gentoo based Linux system Kernel
>2.4.X. I have never setup qpopper before and after looking at the
>QPopper manual I see a lot of things but no actuall help. What I am
>looking at doing is the following:
>
>1. Setup a POP3 server for about 10-20 users.
>  
>
Configure,make and install the qpopper server. Read the documentation. 
Setup {X}inetd if neccessary.

>2. Hopefully use SSL or APOP<all I have read says that MS Outlook can't
>authenticate with APOP, is this true?
>  
>
Forget APOP. IIRC you need to maintain a seperate DB for apop users of 
their cleartext. Stick to SSL. qpopper supports that quite well
(read the doc)

>3. Allow a web interface for users to check there email as well.
>  
>
As other poster points out there are literaly hordes of them! You can 
squirrel away as many as you have patience for.
(knowledge or ability to follow directions regarding apache/php setup 
will be quite usefull)

http://www.horde.org/imp/
http://www.squirrelmail.org/

>4. I don't need digests right now but it might be cool in the future.
>5. Set up sendmail so that only my users can use it. NO RELAYING!< I
>have found some info on this, but I am sure there is more somewhere.
>  
>
If you stick to sendmail (IMHO a cross between a dragon and dinosaur - 
the debate is which of its qualities is foremost)

Install sendmail. Check your /etc/mail/sendmail.mc for the configuration

Read the sendmail faq at www.sendmail.org
Read the tarball's doc/op/op.ps
Read the tarball's sendmail/README cf/README INSTALL files

To have your users use it, configure your MTA of choice to use STARTTLS 
and SMTPS. Then you can safely use SMTP AUTH for your roaming users.

For legacy users, dracd is a nice alternative that works fine for 
sendmail and qpopper installations.
http://mail.cc.umanitoba.ca/drac/

>6. Get some sleep at night! 
>  
>
Spend a day or two on the documentation and at the commandline and you 
will be set.
I advise printing out all the documentation you can find about the 
packages you choose to go with

Printed books: Sendmail 3rd edition, DNS and BIND

I have some meager experience with admin'ng a sendmail box -- 
www.jmaimon.com/sendmail

>I have never setup POP3, I have set up an Exchange server, but I really
>don't want to really on MS at all if I can help it! Any help,
>suggestions would be great!
>  
>
The interesting thing about new incarnations of Exchange and the old 
Unix email philosophy is that now both Unix and Microsoft have the 
systems's idea of users and email intricately bound. In conventional 
systems, pop3 is a method of accessing a unix users mail spool file. You 
might also want to add imap access.

Here is one: http://www.washington.edu/imap/

Nowadays, with ldap and the like it has become much easier for unix 
systems to abstract the mail system away from the unix users systems.

Joe

>Patrick O'Neal
>
>
>  
>


Date: Tue, 6 Jan 2004 23:49:33 +1100
From: Rob Coates <rob at kissmurphy.com dot au>
Subject: Does qpopper support mbx mailbox format ?

Dear People,

Qpopper appeals to me for various reasons however, I am currently using
unix mbx mailbox format and wu-popd and would like to stick mbx as it
has solved a past wu-popd multiple expunge problem with "lookout"
clients.

Can qpopper be made to use mbx format ? It doesn't seem to natively as
the lack of a From line confuses it and I can't find anything related
in the FAQ, manual or from a "quick" perusal of this list's archives.

Alternatilely, maybe qpopper doesn't suffer under lookout as wu-popd
does.

What are peoples experiences ?

Cheers and thanks for the forum to ask these questions!

Rob

-- 

ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤

                Rob Coates
                Kissmurphy Enterprises
                02 9876 8007
                0415 190 435
                www.kissmurphy.com.au

        ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°


Date: Tue, 6 Jan 2004 07:55:10 -0800 (PST)
From: Nickolas Ray Ellson <grimm at nickellson dot com>
Subject: Re: Does qpopper support mbx mailbox format ?



I use Qpopper in MBOX format with outlook 2000 ok, I haven't got around to
 
using SSL yet.. In my enviornment (Gentoo Linux) I defined a global USE 
variable that directs mail applications to compile with "mbox" capability.
 
When I used RedHat 7-9 it was just automatically in mbox format.

So it can be done, though I am no expert.

Nick



On Tue, 6 Jan 2004, Rob Coates wrote:

> Dear People,
> 
> Qpopper appeals to me for various reasons however, I am currently using
> unix mbx mailbox format and wu-popd and would like to stick mbx as it
> has solved a past wu-popd multiple expunge problem with "lookout"
> clients.
> 
> Can qpopper be made to use mbx format ? It doesn't seem to natively as
> the lack of a From line confuses it and I can't find anything related
> in the FAQ, manual or from a "quick" perusal of this list's archives.
> 
> Alternatilely, maybe qpopper doesn't suffer under lookout as wu-popd
> does.
> 
> What are peoples experiences ?
> 
> Cheers and thanks for the forum to ask these questions!
> 
> Rob
> 
> -- 
> 
> ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`
°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø
> 
>                 Rob Coates
>                 Kissmurphy Enterprises
>                 02 9876 8007
>                 0415 190 435
>                 www.kissmurphy.com.au
> 
>         ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤
º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤ø,,,,ø¤º°`°º¤
ø
> 

Date: Tue, 06 Jan 2004 08:17:49 -0800
From: Kenneth Porter <shiva at sewingwitch dot com>
Subject: Re: Does qpopper support mbx mailbox format ?

--On Tuesday, January 06, 2004 7:55 AM -0800 Nickolas Ray Ellson 
<grimm at nickellson dot com> wrote:

> I use Qpopper in MBOX format with outlook 2000 ok, I haven't got around
> to  using SSL yet.. In my enviornment (Gentoo Linux) I defined a global
> USE  variable that directs mail applications to compile with "mbox"
> capability.  When I used RedHat 7-9 it was just automatically in mbox
> format.

mbox and mbx are two different formats. mbox is the traditional Unix text 
format. mbx is a format used by the c-client library (part of the UW-IMAP 
package). Like mbox, a folder is a single file. But it includes a binary 
header that maintains folder metadata, making the file more efficient to 
search. You can use it with sendmail/procmail by using the dmail delivery 
program. Unfortunately, qpopper lacks any code to access this format of 
file. Ideally a patch would use the c-client library to accomplish this 
access, guaranteeing compatible locking semantics with dmail and other 
UW-IMAP utilities.



Date: Tue, 6 Jan 2004 15:58:12 -0500
From: Chuck Yerkes <chuck+qpopper at yerkes dot com>
Subject: Re: setting up a new QPopper server

Quoting Joe Maimon (jmaimon at ttec dot com):
...
> >2. Hopefully use SSL or APOP<all I have read says that MS Outlook can't
> >authenticate with APOP, is this true?
> > 
> Forget APOP. IIRC you need to maintain a seperate DB for apop users of 
> their cleartext. Stick to SSL. qpopper supports that quite well
> (read the doc)

I can support 5000 concurent clients with APOP and cleartext
connections.  I cannot support 200 SSL connections concurrently.
While pop connections are not QUITE as short lived as https,
they aren't long lived either.  The SSL startup times and math
are non-trivial.

> >3. Allow a web interface for users to check there email as well.

You may want IMAP which supports folders and expects mail to remain
on the server.  In contrast, POP was built with the intent that you
go and get your mail and take it with yout.

Note that Version 7 "mbox" files don't really scale that well
(removing message 15 from a 5000 message spool file means a LOT
of rewrites).

> As other poster points out there are literaly hordes of them! You can 
> squirrel away as many as you have patience for.
> (knowledge or ability to follow directions regarding apache/php setup 
> will be quite usefull)
> 
> http://www.horde.org/imp/
> http://www.squirrelmail.org/

> >5. Set up sendmail so that only my users can use it. NO RELAYING!< I
> >have found some info on this, but I am sure there is more somewhere.

SMTP AUTH  - best, but documentation from hell and hard to debug
   as you set it up.
POPb4SMTP - workable, unideal.

> If you stick to sendmail (IMHO a cross between a dragon and dinosaur - 
> the debate is which of its qualities is foremost)
> 
> Install sendmail. Check your /etc/mail/sendmail.mc for the configuration
> 
> Read the sendmail faq at www.sendmail.org
> Read the tarball's doc/op/op.ps
> Read the tarball's sendmail/README cf/README INSTALL files

Or go buy Sendmail Switch from Sendmail Inc and use a web GUI.
(they also have an IMAP server and webmail, though that's
hard to figure out from the website.  Words like "webmail"
and "imap server" seem to come difficultly to marketing people
who do web sites.  That doesn't mean it doesn't work.  I
just fine the price a little hard to stomach for all but
the largest of enterprises).


> To have your users use it, configure your MTA of choice to use STARTTLS 
> and SMTPS. Then you can safely use SMTP AUTH for your roaming users.
> 
> For legacy users, dracd is a nice alternative that works fine for 
> sendmail and qpopper installations.
> http://mail.cc.umanitoba.ca/drac/

From: "Eric" <nyre at kiercorp dot com>
Subject: qpopper, redhat and outlook express
Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2004 08:36:54 -0700

I have setup qpopper on redhat 8, I can telnet to pop3 and see that I have
messages but If I run outlook express I get

The connection to the server has failed. Account: 'mail.xxx.xxx', Server:
'mail.xxx.xxx', Protocol: POP3, Port: 110, Secure(SSL): No, Socket Error:
10060, Error Number: 0x800CCC0E

What am I missing

Eric



From: "Eric" <nyre at kiercorp dot com>
Subject: qpopper telenet test local vs net
Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2004 10:01:08 -0700

I installed qpopper and tested from local machine and telnet xxx pop3 works
fine. However If I telnet from the internet I get nothing , can't connect.
thus when I setup outlook I get an error about no port. what am I missing?
I've gone through GUIDE.pdf , and looked on the net but to no avail.  hmm


Eric



From: "Peter A. Solomon" <psolomon at adelphia dot net>
Subject: RE: qpopper telenet test local vs net
Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2004 13:55:55 -0500

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Eric [mailto:nyre at kiercorp dot com] 
> Sent: Monday, January 12, 2004 12:01 PM
> To: Subscribers of Qpopper
> Subject: qpopper telenet test local vs net
> 
> 
> I installed qpopper and tested from local machine and telnet 
> xxx pop3 works
> fine. However If I telnet from the internet I get nothing , 
> can't connect.
> thus when I setup outlook I get an error about no port. what 
> am I missing?
> I've gone through GUIDE.pdf , and looked on the net but to no 
> avail.  hmm
> 
> 
> Eric

When you say, "Local" I'm assuming your using telent from the same system?
Can you telnet across the same local area network? You also should check
with your ISP and find out what ports they are blocking. They may just
portmap 110 to their particular servers. A good thing to investigate before
you pull your hair out.


Pete


Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2004 11:24:06 -0600
From: Jim Medley <jmedley at aesrg.tamu dot edu>
Subject: --disable-status

Hello All,

I have a problem when downloading my email to two different 
computers. The first computer to download will show the email as 
unread, while the second shows the same email as read. This is a real 
problem when someone sends an email and their clock is off. Anyway, I 
am using Eudora 6.0 for the Macintosh on both computers. Our mail 
server is sendmail / qpopper on a Mac OS 10.2.8. I have tried to 
re-configure qpopper with the --disable-status flag but it did not 
solve the problem. Any suggestions?  Thanks in advance, Jim

-- 

James Medley
Senior Research Associate
Texas A&M University
Agricultural Research and Extension Center
Beaumont, Texas 77713
(409)752-2741 ext 2252
jmedley at aesrg.tamu dot edu

From: "Willem van den Berge" <wvandenberge at altep dot com>
Subject: qpopper openSSL "ERR POP EOF or I/O Error"
Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2004 15:52:29 -0700

Hello,

I'm trying to install the 4.05 version of qpopper on my Solaris 9 box. I
configured it with 

	./configure -enable-debugging -with-openssl

My config file looaks like:

	set tls-support = stls
	set tls-server-cert-file = /etc/mail/certs/cert.pem

I'm starting from Inetd with:

	pop3    stream  tcp     nowait  root    /usr/local/sbin/popper
qpopper -d -s -f /etc/mail/pop/qpopper.config

All compiled well, and I went through the creation of a certificate with a
test CA. When I connect without SLL everything works beautifully.  When I
connect with SSL from Outlook 2003 I see the entries under <<LOG1>> below in
my log file.

When I connect from Eudora I see the, slightly different, log under <<LOG2>>

I have checked the search engines and I have seen references to the "ERR POP
EOF or I/O" problem between Outlook XP/2003 and qpopper. Some postings even
went so far as to offer a patch for qpopper (which I tried but did not
work), 

Interestingly the problem seems to manifest itself differently with Outlook
then Eudora or maybe I'm actually looking at two problems.

Any and all help would be greatly appreciated,

	Thank you,

		Willem




<<LOG1>>
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...read line 1
(22): set tls-support = stls [pop_config.c:1370]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] Set tls-support
to STLS (2) [pop_config.c:1234]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...read line 2
(51): set tls-server-cert-file = /etc/mail/certs/cert.pem
[pop_config.c:1370]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] Set
tls-server-cert-file to "/etc/mail/certs/cert.pem" [pop_config.c:1250]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] Finished
processing config file '/etc/mail/pop/qpopper.config'; rslt=1
[pop_config.c:1518]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] (v4.0.5)
Servicing request from "host" at 11.22.33.44 [pop_init.c:1186]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] before TLS;
tls_support==2 [popper.c:181]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...Initializing
OpenSSL library (version OpenSSL 0.9.7c 30 Sep 2003) [pop_tls_openssl.c:230]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...have
/dev/urandom; skipping PRNG seeding [pop_tls_openssl.c:288]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...setting
method to SSLv23_server_method [pop_tls_openssl.c:312]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...allocating
OpenSSL context [pop_tls_openssl.c:342]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...setting
certificate file /etc/mail/certs/cert.pem [pop_tls_openssl.c:363]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...private key
file not set; assuming private key is in cert (/etc/mail/certs/cert.pem)
[pop_tls_openssl.c:380]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...setting
private key file /etc/mail/certs/cert.pem [pop_tls_openssl.c:384]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...verifying
private key against certificate [pop_tls_openssl.c:397]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug]
...(tls_cipher_list not specified) [pop_tls_openssl.c:424]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...allocating
OpenSSL connection [pop_tls_openssl.c:435]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...setting
input (0) and output (0) file descriptors [pop_tls_openssl.c:446]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...successfully
completed OpenSSL initialization [pop_tls_openssl.c:465]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] TLS Init
[popper.c:202]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] (v4.0.5) Intro
[popper.c:247]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] +OK Qpopper
(version 4.0.5) at ns1 starting.   [popper.c:260]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] Qpopper ready
for input from (null) at 11.22.33.44 [11.22.33.44] [popper.c:294]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.notice] (null) at
11.22.33.44 (11.22.33.44): -ERR POP EOF or I/O Error [popper.c:820]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] +OK Pop server
at ns1 signing off. [popper.c:360]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug]
pTLS->m_pPOP->tls_started == false [pop_tls_openssl.c:823]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] freeing
m_OpenSSLconn [pop_tls_openssl.c:827]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] freeing
m_OpenSSLctx [pop_tls_openssl.c:833]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug]
openssl_shutdown returning 0 [pop_tls_openssl.c:838]
Jan 12 15:33:37 ns1 qpopper[12590]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] (v4.0.5) Ending
request from "" at (11.22.33.44) 11.22.33.44 [popper.c:378]

<<LOG2>>
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] Debugging
turned on (-d) [pop_init.c:723]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] Will generate
stats records (-s) [pop_init.c:858]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] tls-support=1
(-l) [pop_init.c:796]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] Processing
config file '/etc/mail/pop/qpopper.config'; CallTime=1 [pop_config.c:1334]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...read line 1
(22): set tls-support = stls [pop_config.c:1370]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] Set tls-support
to STLS (2) [pop_config.c:1234]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...read line 2
(51): set tls-server-cert-file = /etc/mail/certs/cert.pem
[pop_config.c:1370]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] Set
tls-server-cert-file to "/etc/mail/certs/cert.pem" [pop_config.c:1250]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] Finished
processing config file '/etc/mail/pop/qpopper.config'; rslt=1
[pop_config.c:1518]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] (v4.0.5)
Servicing request from "host" at 11.22.33.44 [pop_init.c:1186]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] before TLS;
tls_support==2 [popper.c:181]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...Initializing
OpenSSL library (version OpenSSL 0.9.7c 30 Sep 2003) [pop_tls_openssl.c:230]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...have
/dev/urandom; skipping PRNG seeding [pop_tls_openssl.c:288]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...setting
method to SSLv23_server_method [pop_tls_openssl.c:312]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...allocating
OpenSSL context [pop_tls_openssl.c:342]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...setting
certificate file /etc/mail/certs/cert.pem [pop_tls_openssl.c:363]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...private key
file not set; assuming private key is in cert (/etc/mail/certs/cert.pem)
[pop_tls_openssl.c:380]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...setting
private key file /etc/mail/certs/cert.pem [pop_tls_openssl.c:384]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...verifying
private key against certificate [pop_tls_openssl.c:397]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug]
...(tls_cipher_list not specified) [pop_tls_openssl.c:424]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...allocating
OpenSSL connection [pop_tls_openssl.c:435]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...setting
input (0) and output (0) file descriptors [pop_tls_openssl.c:446]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] ...successfully
completed OpenSSL initialization [pop_tls_openssl.c:465]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] TLS Init
[popper.c:202]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] (v4.0.5) Intro
[popper.c:247]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] +OK Qpopper
(version 4.0.5) at ns1 starting.   [popper.c:260]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] Qpopper ready
for input from (null) at 11.22.33.44 [11.22.33.44] [popper.c:294]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] Received (4):
"CAPA" [pop_get_command.c:105]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] capa returned
1; CurrentState now auth1 [popper.c:338]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] Qpopper ready
for input from (null) at 11.22.33.44 [11.22.33.44] [popper.c:294]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] Received (4):
"QUIT" [pop_get_command.c:105]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] quit returned
1; CurrentState now halt [popper.c:338]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] +OK Pop server
at ns1 signing off. [popper.c:360]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug]
pTLS->m_pPOP->tls_started == false [pop_tls_openssl.c:823]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] freeing
m_OpenSSLconn [pop_tls_openssl.c:827]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] freeing
m_OpenSSLctx [pop_tls_openssl.c:833]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug]
openssl_shutdown returning 0 [pop_tls_openssl.c:838]
Jan 12 15:28:23 ns1 qpopper[12588]: [ID 702911 local1.debug] (v4.0.5) Ending
request from "" at (11.22.33.44) 11.22.33.44 [popper.c:378]




Date: Mon, 12 Jan 2004 15:07:22 -0500
From: Chuck Yerkes <chuck+qpopper at yerkes dot com>
Subject: Re: qpopper, redhat and outlook express

Quoting Eric (nyre at kiercorp dot com):
> I have setup qpopper on redhat 8, I can telnet to pop3 and see that I have
> messages but If I run outlook express I get
> 
> The connection to the server has failed. Account: 'mail.xxx.xxx', Server:
> 'mail.xxx.xxx', Protocol: POP3, Port: 110, Secure(SSL): No, Socket Error:
> 10060, Error Number: 0x800CCC0E
> 
> What am I missing

Basic debugging:
qpopper will log things to syslog.
More if you turn up debugging.

tcpdump port 110 

From the pop machine will show you if the packets even
reach the machine.

Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2004 21:50:32 -0800
From: "Derek C." <coffee at blarg dot net>
Subject: Re: qpopper telenet test local vs net

Please see the reply that was sent to you regarding this last week:

>When you say, "Local" I'm assuming your using telent from the same system?
>Can you telnet across the same local area network? You also should check
>with your ISP and find out what ports they are blocking. They may just
>portmap 110 to their particular servers. A good thing to investigate before
>you pull your hair out.
>
>
>Pete




At 09:01 AM 1/12/2004, Eric wrote:
>I installed qpopper and tested from local machine and telnet xxx pop3 works
>fine. However If I telnet from the internet I get nothing , can't connect.
>thus when I setup outlook I get an error about no port. what am I missing?
>I've gone through GUIDE.pdf , and looked on the net but to no avail.  hmm
>
>
>Eric


Date: Thu, 15 Jan 2004 00:25:17 -0800
From: "Derek C." <coffee at blarg dot net>
Subject: Re: qpopper telenet test local vs net

Hmm... apparently his SMTP server isn't working either...

*** This message was automatically generated by the MailMax Error Responder ***

Sorry, your message from <coffee at blarg dot net> to 
<eric at kierconstructioncorp dot com> could not be delivered. The specific error is:

   Unable to connect to the destination server.

10 attempts will be made to re-send your e-mail.  Each attempt will be 4 
hours apart.



At 09:50 PM 1/14/2004, Derek C. wrote:
>Please see the reply that was sent to you regarding this last week:
>
>>When you say, "Local" I'm assuming your using telent from the same system?
>>Can you telnet across the same local area network? You also should check
>>with your ISP and find out what ports they are blocking. They may just
>>portmap 110 to their particular servers. A good thing to investigate before
>>you pull your hair out.
>>
>>
>>Pete
>
>
>
>
>At 09:01 AM 1/12/2004, Eric wrote:
>>I installed qpopper and tested from local machine and telnet xxx pop3 works
>>fine. However If I telnet from the internet I get nothing , can't connect.
>>thus when I setup outlook I get an error about no port. what am I missing?
>>I've gone through GUIDE.pdf , and looked on the net but to no avail.  hmm
>>
>>
>>Eric


Date: Thu, 15 Jan 2004 11:59:29 +0000 (WET)
From: Hugh Sasse Staff Elec Eng <hgs at dmu.ac dot uk>
Subject: latest gcc but all hosts = 0.0.0.0

I have obtained the latest qpopper (4.0.5) and built it
successfully on a Solaris 9 system.  All the hosts show up as
unverfiable 0.0.0.0.  So I read the FAQ and this tells me:

   All IP addresses are logged as  0.0.0.0

       This is usually caused by a problem in the specific version
       of gcc on your platform.  Try upgrading gcc.

So I did that -- obtained and build gcc-3.3.2 which is the latest
gcc.  Rebuilt qpopper, did make install, and kill -HUP the inetdpid.

I am still getting the errors.

Questions arising from this include:
   How can I be *sure* the new daemon is being used?
      I could reboot, but it is a bit drastic.
   Which versions of {GCC,platform) are known to fix this problem?
   Has this problem been sucessfully resolved on Solaris?
   If so was this by other means than the latest GCC?

        Thank you,
        Hugh



From: Harald Kapper <hk at kapper dot net>
Subject: startup scripts or pid of qpopper?
Date: Sun, 18 Jan 2004 21:48:49 +0100

hi
I'm trying to run popper as a stand-alone service on redhat, my only
pitfall in adopting an existing init-script to work with qpopper is
that I can't find how to force popper to write its pid in some file...

any suggestions on this one?

thx in advance,
Harald Kapper, icq# 36178328         kapper.net, inc.
managing director                    loeblichgasse  6
chief software development           1090 vienna, .at
tel +43 1 3195500-0, fax +43 1 3195502, hk at kapper dot net
--------------quote.of.the.day--------------
"Never offend people with style when you can
offend them with substance."     --Sam Brown

Date: Mon, 19 Jan 2004 15:47:38 +0100
From: Bart Dumon <bart at crossbar dot net>
Subject: qpopper high load average

Hi,

i'm running qpopper 4.0.5 on linux (2.4.x) with maildir patch 
(0.12) and pam_radius for authentication. 

right now, i'm suffering from high cpu load averages once it's
gets too busy the load will skyrocket to abnormal high values
and the service will become unavailable untill it's restarted. 
this typically happens during peak times when we receive 15 pop 
sessions/sec.

at first it thought it was radius related because i'm seeing the
following error message during the peak times:

Jan 19 14:07:41 xxx popper[13404]: pam_radius_auth: RADIUS server x.x.x.x failed to respond

but even with a more performant radius, the problem persists, it
looks like the radius errors are a consequence of the problem and
not the real cause.
everything is pointing in the direction of the amount of pop sessions
whenever you get to the 13-14pops/sec barrier, qpopper seems to
be giving up. it's not traffic related because the amount of traffic
is higher outside the peak hours.

i've seen posts of people suffering from the same problem, but i
didn't find any solutions up untill now, any hints are appreciated.


bart
--


Subject: Re: [spam] qpopper telenet test local vs net
From: rcarpent at cmp dot com
Date: Mon, 19 Jan 2004 12:49:31 -0500

Do you have a firewall ?
Is port 110 open?

******************************************************************************
Rob J. Carpenter
CMP Media LLC
Data Center 4th Floor
600 Community Drive
Manhasset, New York, NY 11030
E-Mail: rcarpent at cmp dot com / robjcarpenter at yahoo dot com
Phone:  516-562-5907   Cell: 516-532-2951 Pager:  516-372-4576
Quote:  The needs of the many out weigh the needs of the
                few or the one.

******************************************************************************


                                                                                                                                        
                      "Eric"                                                                                                            
                      <nyre at kiercorp.c         To:      Subscribers of Qpopper <qpopper at lists dot pensive dot org>                              
                      om>                      cc:                                                                                      
                                               bcc:                                                                                     
                      01/12/2004 12:01         Subject: [spam] qpopper telenet test local vs net                                        
                      PM                                                                                                                
                                                                                                                                        
                                                                                                                                        




I installed qpopper and tested from local machine and telnet xxx pop3 works
fine. However If I telnet from the internet I get nothing , can't connect.
thus when I setup outlook I get an error about no port. what am I missing?
I've gone through GUIDE.pdf , and looked on the net but to no avail.  hmm


Eric






Date: Mon, 19 Jan 2004 09:58:26 -0800 (PST)
From: The Little Prince <thelittleprince at asteroid-b612 dot org>
Subject: Re: qpopper high load average

On Mon, 19 Jan 2004, Bart Dumon wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> i'm running qpopper 4.0.5 on linux (2.4.x) with maildir patch 
> (0.12) and pam_radius for authentication. 
> 
> right now, i'm suffering from high cpu load averages once it's
> gets too busy the load will skyrocket to abnormal high values

processor specs? actual kernel version?
does it happen without the maildir feature or without radius auth., i.e. 
in a normal setup?

--Tony
.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.
Anthony J. Biacco                            Network Administrator/Engineer
thelittleprince at asteroid-b612.org              http://www.asteroid-b612 dot org

       "You find magic from your god, and I find magic everywhere" 
.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.


Date: Mon, 19 Jan 2004 13:17:25 -0500 (EST)
From: Alan Brown <alanb at digistar dot com>
Subject: Re: qpopper high load average

On Mon, 19 Jan 2004, The Little Prince wrote:

> processor specs? actual kernel version?

And how qpopper is being started?


Date: Mon, 19 Jan 2004 19:50:16 +0100
From: Bart Dumon <bart at crossbar dot net>
Subject: Re: qpopper high load average


On Mon, Jan 19, 2004 at 01:17:25PM -0500, Alan Brown wrote:
> 
> > processor specs? actual kernel version?
> 
> And how qpopper is being started?

qpopper runs standalone, ie. not from inetd.


bart
--


Date: Mon, 19 Jan 2004 19:49:19 +0100
From: Bart Dumon <bart at crossbar dot net>
Subject: Re: qpopper high load average

On Mon, Jan 19, 2004 at 09:58:26AM -0800, The Little Prince wrote:
> 
> > i'm running qpopper 4.0.5 on linux (2.4.x) with maildir patch 
> > (0.12) and pam_radius for authentication. 
> > 
> > right now, i'm suffering from high cpu load averages once it's
> > gets too busy the load will skyrocket to abnormal high values
> 
> processor specs? actual kernel version?
> does it happen without the maildir feature or without radius auth., i.e. 
> in a normal setup?

it's a dual xeon 2.4Ghz, 2.5Gb RAM, kernel = 2.4.21. i don't know if it happens in
a normal setup and i don't really have the possibility to test that...


bart
--


Date: Mon, 19 Jan 2004 14:19:22 -0500
Subject: Re: qpopper high load average
From: Ken Rossman <rossman at columbia dot edu>

On Monday, January 19, 2004, at 01:50 PM, Bart Dumon wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 19, 2004 at 01:17:25PM -0500, Alan Brown wrote:
>>> processor specs? actual kernel version?
>>
>> And how qpopper is being started?
>
> qpopper runs standalone, ie. not from inetd.

Actually, it can be run either way (or so says the manual)...

K


Date: Tue, 20 Jan 2004 13:16:53 -1000
From: Clifton Royston <cliftonr at lava dot net>
Subject: Re: qpopper high load average

On Mon, Jan 19, 2004 at 03:47:38PM +0100, Bart Dumon wrote:
> i'm running qpopper 4.0.5 on linux (2.4.x) with maildir patch 
> (0.12) and pam_radius for authentication. 
> 
> right now, i'm suffering from high cpu load averages once it's
> gets too busy the load will skyrocket to abnormal high values
> and the service will become unavailable untill it's restarted. 
> this typically happens during peak times when we receive 15 pop 
> sessions/sec.
> 
> at first it thought it was radius related because i'm seeing the
> following error message during the peak times:
> 
> Jan 19 14:07:41 xxx popper[13404]: pam_radius_auth: RADIUS server x.x.x.x failed to respond
> 
> but even with a more performant radius, the problem persists, it
> looks like the radius errors are a consequence of the problem and
> not the real cause.
> everything is pointing in the direction of the amount of pop sessions
> whenever you get to the 13-14pops/sec barrier, qpopper seems to
> be giving up. it's not traffic related because the amount of traffic
> is higher outside the peak hours.

  Usually this kind of overload is due to many users having large
mailboxes (e.g. 30MB and up) in the old UNIX mbox format.  In this
format, the file needs to be recopied to update the messages' status
when popped, which results in the POP sessions completely saturating
your disk I/O bandwidth.

  I have also seen some Radius daemons show a tendency to die under
this type of heavy load.

  I haven't seen reports of this with maildir format.  However, what
you're describing is consistent with I/O bandwidth saturation.

  If you are saturating your disk bandwidth, you'll see a large number
of concurrent tasks waiting to run ("load" as shown by the uptime
command or xload) but a high proportion of idle time shown by vmstat.
At that point you'll need to try to figure out why all this bandwidth
is still going on even with maildir format; I don't use that patch, so
I can't help with troubleshooting it.
  -- Clifton

-- 
          Clifton Royston  --  cliftonr at tikitechnologies dot com 
         Tiki Technologies Lead Programmer/Software Architect
Did you ever fly a kite in bed?  Did you ever walk with ten cats on your head?
  Did you ever milk this kind of cow?  Well we can do it.  We know how.
If you never did, you should.  These things are fun, and fun is good.
                                                                 -- Dr. Seuss

Subject: setting up a new QPopper server
From: Patrick O'Neal <patrick at oneal dot net>
Date: Tue, 20 Jan 2004 17:25:52 -0600

All,

I am setting up a new qpopper server, and I am a complete newbie to
setting up mail in the unix/linux world. I have configured an exchange
box on ms, but that is easy as you just click through the wizards.
Anyway, how does it work? How does Qpopper know that it is supposed to
server the mail for a particular domain, or is this accomplished by an
mx record? also, since I am going to allow clients to connect to my
server and they will need to send email as well, does qpopper send mail
another words, if they set there smtp server to the same as the pop
server will they be able to send mail, or am I just crazy. I know this
sounds like duh, he should know this, but once again in the MS world
things are done by a simple wizard and then click and point. I haven't
been in the Unix/Linux world very long, but I know that it has been
easier so far even though there are no click and point wizards. So
anyway, please respond. PS I know that SMTP and POP use different ports
so I realize that unless qpopper listens on both ports, it cannot send
mail. Thanks,

Patrick O'Neal
webmaster and more

www.awofm.info 


Date: Tue, 20 Jan 2004 15:45:49 -0800 (PST)
From: The Little Prince <thelittleprince at asteroid-b612 dot org>
Subject: Re: qpopper high load average

I have heard of any performance problems with my patch. People have 
reported really good perf. with thousands of users.
Nobody has reported anything with radius auth. used at the same time.
Not being able to test any other cases, e.g. local auth. and maildir, 
radius, and mbox, etc.. doesn't help you.
Like Clifton said, check your stats. Watch vmstat statistics.
Even strace some of the processes to see what calls they spend the most 
time in.

--Tony
.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.
Anthony J. Biacco                            Network Administrator/Engineer
thelittleprince at asteroid-b612.org              http://www.asteroid-b612 dot org

       "You find magic from your god, and I find magic everywhere" 
.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.

On Tue, 20 Jan 2004, Clifton Royston wrote:

> On Mon, Jan 19, 2004 at 03:47:38PM +0100, Bart Dumon wrote:
> > i'm running qpopper 4.0.5 on linux (2.4.x) with maildir patch 
> > (0.12) and pam_radius for authentication. 
> > 
> > right now, i'm suffering from high cpu load averages once it's
> > gets too busy the load will skyrocket to abnormal high values
> > and the service will become unavailable untill it's restarted. 
> > this typically happens during peak times when we receive 15 pop 
> > sessions/sec.
> > 
> > at first it thought it was radius related because i'm seeing the
> > following error message during the peak times:
> > 
> > Jan 19 14:07:41 xxx popper[13404]: pam_radius_auth: RADIUS server x.x.x.x failed to respond
> > 
> > but even with a more performant radius, the problem persists, it
> > looks like the radius errors are a consequence of the problem and
> > not the real cause.
> > everything is pointing in the direction of the amount of pop sessions
> > whenever you get to the 13-14pops/sec barrier, qpopper seems to
> > be giving up. it's not traffic related because the amount of traffic
> > is higher outside the peak hours.
> 
>   Usually this kind of overload is due to many users having large
> mailboxes (e.g. 30MB and up) in the old UNIX mbox format.  In this
> format, the file needs to be recopied to update the messages' status
> when popped, which results in the POP sessions completely saturating
> your disk I/O bandwidth.
> 
>   I have also seen some Radius daemons show a tendency to die under
> this type of heavy load.
> 
>   I haven't seen reports of this with maildir format.  However, what
> you're describing is consistent with I/O bandwidth saturation.
> 
>   If you are saturating your disk bandwidth, you'll see a large number
> of concurrent tasks waiting to run ("load" as shown by the uptime
> command or xload) but a high proportion of idle time shown by vmstat.
> At that point you'll need to try to figure out why all this bandwidth
> is still going on even with maildir format; I don't use that patch, so
> I can't help with troubleshooting it.
>   -- Clifton
> 
> 

-- 
.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.
Anthony J. Biacco                            Network Administrator/Engineer
thelittleprince at asteroid-b612.org              http://www.asteroid-b612 dot org

       "You find magic from your god, and I find magic everywhere" 
.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.


Date: Tue, 20 Jan 2004 16:12:30 -0800 (PST)
From: The Little Prince <thelittleprince at asteroid-b612 dot org>
Subject: Re: setting up a new QPopper server

On Tue, 20 Jan 2004, Patrick O'Neal wrote:

> All,
> 
> I am setting up a new qpopper server, and I am a complete newbie to
> setting up mail in the unix/linux world. I have configured an exchange
> box on ms, but that is easy as you just click through the wizards.
> Anyway, how does it work? How does Qpopper know that it is supposed to
> server the mail for a particular domain, or is this accomplished by an
> mx record?

Qpopper doesn't natively support multiple domains. It knows of 
username-based mailboxes. There are patches to support multiple domains 
though. Otherwise, you'll have to point your domain users to 
local username mailboxes of a similar name in your SMTP server.
e.g. aliases such as
EMAIL ADDRESS            LOCAL MAILBOX
user1 at domain1 dot com   ->   user1
user2 at domain1 dot com   ->   user2
the problem comes when you have another domain with a user of the same 
name, e.g. user1 at domain1 dot com and user1 at domain2 dot com, you can't point them 
both to user1. You might think about pointing to local users called 
user1+domain1 and user1+domain2 or something similar
See your SMTP server's docs for instruction on this.
As you see, it can get a little hairy.
I'd recommend trying a patch to support the multiple domains first, and if 
that confuses the hell out of you too much, do the above instead.
I have a patch to do this with a MySQL db of users/email address, you can 
find it at: 
http://www.asteroid-b612.org/software#qpopper
I'm sure there are a couple others out there.

> also, since I am going to allow clients to connect to my
> server and they will need to send email as well, does qpopper send mail
> another words, if they set there smtp server to the same as the pop
> server will they be able to send mail, or am I just crazy. I know this

Technically, yes, it CAN, but normally, DON'T.
Use your SMTP server, that's what it's there for.
If your SMTP and POP3 server will sit on the same machine (usually), 
your users will point their outgoing mail server to smtp.yourdomain.com 
and their incoming to pop3.yourdomain.com (or theirdomain.com, if they 
have) and you'll point those hostname to the same IP on the machine. (You 
don't have to use the hostnames 'smtp' and pop3', you can use the names 
'in' and 'out', or whatever you prefer for your users.)

--Tony

.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.
Anthony J. Biacco                            Network Administrator/Engineer
thelittleprince at asteroid-b612.org              http://www.asteroid-b612 dot org

       "You find magic from your god, and I find magic everywhere" 
.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.



Date: Tue, 20 Jan 2004 19:42:48 -0500 (EST)
From: "Louis A. DeRobertis" <louis at suffolk.lib.ny dot us>
Subject: Load Average - Qpopper



Hi Bart,

I saw something similar to this before I recompiled qpopper with the
--enable-servermode option.  Have you tried that?

Regards-

Lou

On Mon, Jan 19, 2004 at 03:47:38PM +0100, Bart Dumon wrote:
i'm running qpopper 4.0.5 on linux (2.4.x) with maildir patch
(0.12) and pam_radius for authentication.

right now, i'm suffering from high cpu load averages once it's
gets too busy the load will skyrocket to abnormal high values
and the service will become unavailable untill it's restarted.
this typically happens during peak times when we receive 15 pop
sessions/sec.

at first it thought it was radius related because i'm seeing the
following error message during the peak times:

Jan 19 14:07:41 xxx popper[13404]: pam_radius_auth: RADIUS server x.x.x.x
failed to respond

but even with a more performant radius, the problem persists, it
looks like the radius errors are a consequence of the problem and
not the real cause.
everything is pointing in the direction of the amount of pop sessions
whenever you get to the 13-14pops/sec barrier, qpopper seems to
be giving up. it's not traffic related because the amount of traffic
is higher outside the peak hours.





--------------------
Louis DeRobertis
Network Administrator
Suffolk Cooperative Library System



From: "Paul" <paul at kbs.net dot au>
Subject: Re: qpopper high load average
Date: Wed, 21 Jan 2004 11:24:12 +1100

How many connections/sec for the server during peak?  What does the load avg
get to? What storage is it (the mail spool)? What filesystem?

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Bart Dumon" <bart at crossbar dot net>
To: "The Little Prince" <thelittleprince at asteroid-b612 dot org>
Cc: "Bart Dumon" <bart at crossbar dot net>; "Subscribers of Qpopper"
<qpopper at lists.pensive dot org>
Sent: Tuesday, January 20, 2004 5:49 AM
Subject: Re: qpopper high load average


> On Mon, Jan 19, 2004 at 09:58:26AM -0800, The Little Prince wrote:
> >
> > > i'm running qpopper 4.0.5 on linux (2.4.x) with maildir patch
> > > (0.12) and pam_radius for authentication.
> > >
> > > right now, i'm suffering from high cpu load averages once it's
> > > gets too busy the load will skyrocket to abnormal high values
> >
> > processor specs? actual kernel version?
> > does it happen without the maildir feature or without radius auth., i.e.
> > in a normal setup?
>
> it's a dual xeon 2.4Ghz, 2.5Gb RAM, kernel = 2.4.21. i don't know if it
happens in
> a normal setup and i don't really have the possibility to test that...
>
>
> bart
> --
>
>


Date: Tue, 20 Jan 2004 17:32:49 -0800 (PST)
From: The Little Prince <thelittleprince at asteroid-b612 dot org>
Subject: Re: Load Average - Qpopper

On Tue, 20 Jan 2004, Louis A. DeRobertis wrote:

> 
> 
> Hi Bart,
> 
> I saw something similar to this before I recompiled qpopper with the
> --enable-servermode option.  Have you tried that?
> 

there is no servermode with the maildir feature.

--Tony
.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.
Anthony J. Biacco                            Network Administrator/Engineer
thelittleprince at asteroid-b612.org              http://www.asteroid-b612 dot org

       "You find magic from your god, and I find magic everywhere" 
.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.

> Regards-
> 
> Lou
> 
> On Mon, Jan 19, 2004 at 03:47:38PM +0100, Bart Dumon wrote:
> i'm running qpopper 4.0.5 on linux (2.4.x) with maildir patch
> (0.12) and pam_radius for authentication.
> 
> right now, i'm suffering from high cpu load averages once it's
> gets too busy the load will skyrocket to abnormal high values
> and the service will become unavailable untill it's restarted.
> this typically happens during peak times when we receive 15 pop
> sessions/sec.
> 
> at first it thought it was radius related because i'm seeing the
> following error message during the peak times:
> 
> Jan 19 14:07:41 xxx popper[13404]: pam_radius_auth: RADIUS server x.x.x.x
> failed to respond
> 
> but even with a more performant radius, the problem persists, it
> looks like the radius errors are a consequence of the problem and
> not the real cause.
> everything is pointing in the direction of the amount of pop sessions
> whenever you get to the 13-14pops/sec barrier, qpopper seems to
> be giving up. it's not traffic related because the amount of traffic
> is higher outside the peak hours.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> --------------------
> Louis DeRobertis
> Network Administrator
> Suffolk Cooperative Library System
> 
> 
> 

-- 
.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.
Anthony J. Biacco                            Network Administrator/Engineer
thelittleprince at asteroid-b612.org              http://www.asteroid-b612 dot org

       "You find magic from your god, and I find magic everywhere" 
.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.


Date: Tue, 20 Jan 2004 17:36:02 -0800
From: Chuck Yerkes <chuck+qpopper at yerkes dot com>
Subject: Re: Load Average - Qpopper

Nick Christenson wrote "sendmail performance tuning."

He also had a lot to do with building Earthlink's email setup (before 1998).
And he got to do that kind of thing later with qpopper and other stuff.
He knows a lot about tuning.

And he wrote it down.   Check out his book, it may have serveral bits of useful
info for you.

Quoting Louis A. DeRobertis (louis at suffolk.lib.ny dot us):
> 
> 
> Hi Bart,
> 
> I saw something similar to this before I recompiled qpopper with the
> --enable-servermode option.  Have you tried that?
> 
> Regards-
> 
> Lou
> 
> On Mon, Jan 19, 2004 at 03:47:38PM +0100, Bart Dumon wrote:
> i'm running qpopper 4.0.5 on linux (2.4.x) with maildir patch
> (0.12) and pam_radius for authentication.
> 
> right now, i'm suffering from high cpu load averages once it's
> gets too busy the load will skyrocket to abnormal high values
> and the service will become unavailable untill it's restarted.
> this typically happens during peak times when we receive 15 pop
> sessions/sec.
> 
> at first it thought it was radius related because i'm seeing the
> following error message during the peak times:
> 
> Jan 19 14:07:41 xxx popper[13404]: pam_radius_auth: RADIUS server x.x.x.x
> failed to respond
> 
> but even with a more performant radius, the problem persists, it
> looks like the radius errors are a consequence of the problem and
> not the real cause.
> everything is pointing in the direction of the amount of pop sessions
> whenever you get to the 13-14pops/sec barrier, qpopper seems to
> be giving up. it's not traffic related because the amount of traffic
> is higher outside the peak hours.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> --------------------
> Louis DeRobertis
> Network Administrator
> Suffolk Cooperative Library System
> 

From: "Paul" <paul at kbs.net dot au>
Subject: Re: setting up a new QPopper server
Date: Wed, 21 Jan 2004 11:13:53 +1100

Hi Patrick,

> I am setting up a new qpopper server, and I am a complete newbie to
> setting up mail in the unix/linux world. I have configured an exchange
> box on ms, but that is easy as you just click through the wizards.
> Anyway, how does it work?

Welcome :) You'll find linux and qpopper a lot more friendly and easier to
use than Exchange.
You'll also find the debugging and performance many times better than
Exchange ever was.

> How does Qpopper know that it is supposed to
> server the mail for a particular domain, or is this accomplished by an
> mx record?

You'll need to run an SMTP server on your linux server. I'd recommend exim
(www.exim.org)
Qpopper is a pop3 server which will read mail from /var/spool/mail/$username
(by default)
Exim is a smtp daemon (aka server) which will accept connections on port 25
and deliver mail for your local users to their mailboxes in /var/spool/mail

> if they set there smtp server to the same as the pop
> server will they be able to send mail, or am I just crazy

Crazy? No, but you will need an SMTP server running on the same host.
Exchange did pop3 and smtp where qpopper only does pop3

Hope this helps

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Patrick O'Neal" <patrick at oneal dot net>
To: "Subscribers of Qpopper" <qpopper at lists.pensive dot org>
Sent: Wednesday, January 21, 2004 10:25 AM
Subject: setting up a new QPopper server


> All,
>
> I am setting up a new qpopper server, and I am a complete newbie to
> setting up mail in the unix/linux world. I have configured an exchange
> box on ms, but that is easy as you just click through the wizards.
> Anyway, how does it work? How does Qpopper know that it is supposed to
> server the mail for a particular domain, or is this accomplished by an
> mx record? also, since I am going to allow clients to connect to my
> server and they will need to send email as well, does qpopper send mail
> another words, if they set there smtp server to the same as the pop
> server will they be able to send mail, or am I just crazy. I know this
> sounds like duh, he should know this, but once again in the MS world
> things are done by a simple wizard and then click and point. I haven't
> been in the Unix/Linux world very long, but I know that it has been
> easier so far even though there are no click and point wizards. So
> anyway, please respond. PS I know that SMTP and POP use different ports
> so I realize that unless qpopper listens on both ports, it cannot send
> mail. Thanks,
>
> Patrick O'Neal
> webmaster and more
>
> www.awofm.info
>
>


From: "Eric" <nyre at kiercorp dot com>
Subject: 
Date: Wed, 21 Jan 2004 13:33:03 -0700

qpopper is supposed to be watching but I am not able to get through with
outlook express.
dump of port 110 shows
timestamp  name of my isp > domain name of mail server S a bunch of numbers
win 65536 <mss 1460, nop,nop, sackOK>
4 times same thing but outlook won't connect?

Eric


From: "Eric" <nyre at kiercorp dot com>
Subject: qpopper and tcpdump110
Date: Wed, 21 Jan 2004 13:33:46 -0700

qpopper is supposed to be watching but I am not able to get through with
outlook express.
dump of port 110 shows
timestamp  name of my isp > domain name of mail server S a bunch of numbers
win 65536 <mss 1460, nop,nop, sackOK>
4 times same thing but outlook won't connect

Eric 



Date: Wed, 21 Jan 2004 22:41:23 +0100
From: Bart Dumon <bart at crossbar dot net>
Subject: Re: qpopper high load average

On Wed, Jan 21, 2004 at 11:24:12AM +1100, Paul wrote:
> How many connections/sec for the server during peak?  What does the load avg
> get to? What storage is it (the mail spool)? What filesystem?

during peaks we get about 15 connections/sec per server, the load
gets up to 800 if we do not interfere. once the popper gets
restarted the load will decrease. the mail spool is kept on a NAS
and is accessed using nfs.


bart
--

Date: Wed, 21 Jan 2004 22:45:20 +0100
From: Bart Dumon <bart at crossbar dot net>
Subject: Re: qpopper high load average

Tony,

i'm not saying it's directly related to the maildir patch, i've had
very good performance just untill 2 weeks ago. the amount of active
users has increased a little, but the load increased dramatically out
of the blue.

i'm really not able to test other cases as far as mailbox format and
authentication is concerned. and yes this is very frustrating for me
too. the amount of mailboxes is just too big to just switch them
to local auth and/or mbox format. we've had a test setup but we're
unable to get to this kind of behavior even when subject to very high
amount of connections. we seem only able to get this problem in the
production environment. i've already thrown in 2 extra boxes (temporary)
which are also handling pop sessions, (this buys us some time, but the 
real problem is certainly not gone). this also gives us the oppurtunity to 
test some stuff and upgrade some stuff to see if it affects the problem. 

now, during peaks, i often see processes waiting to run:

040121 15:16:44  procs -----------memory---------- ---swap-- -----io---- --system-- ----cpu----
040121 15:16:44   r  b   swpd   free   buff  cache   si   so    bi    bo   in    cs us sy id wa
040121 15:16:44   1 18   1792  10608   9620 2002316    0    0    64   401 2605  8911  6 10 85  0
040121 15:16:49  27 15   1792  13892   9608 1998868    0    0    30   890 6057 22022 12 26 62  0
040121 15:16:54  53  9   1792  15940   9624 2001352    0    0    84   187 5711 30160 11 31 59  0
040121 15:16:59  34 10   1792  15604   9668 2014532    0    0    25   326 5919 26858  9 22 68  0
040121 15:17:04   0 17   1792  10544   9728 2016196    0    0    42   371 5158 15635  9 12 78  0
040121 15:17:09   1 15   1792  10488   9624 2005556    0    0    42   364 6380 23565 12 24 64  0
040121 15:17:14   1 21   1792  18812   9620 2007196    0    0    22   816 6423 24094 13 25 62  0
040121 15:17:19   0 22   1792  11908   9640 2014016    0    0   106   482 6697 27224 11 25 64  0
040121 15:17:24  50 13   1792  15136   9648 2014668    0    0    63   179 4901 23929  7 23 69  0
040121 15:17:29   1 17   1792  10652   9692 2019968    0    0    35   186 4472 20241  6 16 77  0
040121 15:17:34   0 18   1792  12152   9716 2012088    0    0    58   221 5410 27104  9 24 67  0

the mailspool is located on a NAS, so it's accesed using nfs, however
the NAS seems to be doing fine, no performance issues to be found there 
untill now, but we're checking this ofcourse.

the problem with running a popper in strace that it outputs an awfull lot of
data and usually the load doesn't start increasing right away. i did see
a bunch (1021) of fd errors only at startup like this:

15:54:41.272417 open("/dev/null", O_RDWR|O_CREAT|O_TRUNC, 0666) = 3
15:54:41.272589 fork()                  = 25607
[pid 25607] 15:54:41.272788 setsid( <unfinished ...>
[pid 25605] 15:54:41.272876 semget(IPC_PRIVATE, 0, 0x1|0 <unfinished ...>
[pid 25607] 15:54:41.272924 <... setsid resumed> ) = 25607
[pid 25605] 15:54:41.272952 <... semget resumed> ) = -1 ENOSYS (Function not implemented)
[pid 25607] 15:54:41.272989 fork( <unfinished ...>
[pid 25605] 15:54:41.273028 _exit(0)    = ?
[pid 25607] 15:54:41.273101 <... fork resumed> ) = 25608
[pid 25608] 15:54:41.273314 chdir("/")  = 0
[pid 25607] 15:54:41.273428 semget(IPC_PRIVATE, 0, 0x1|0 <unfinished ...>
[pid 25608] 15:54:41.273479 getrlimit(0x7, 0xbffff7f8 <unfinished ...>
[pid 25607] 15:54:41.273518 <... semget resumed> ) = -1 ENOSYS (Function not implemented)
[pid 25608] 15:54:41.273546 <... getrlimit resumed> ) = 0
[pid 25607] 15:54:41.273579 _exit(0)    = ?
15:54:41.273610 close(1024)             = -1 EBADF (Bad file descriptor)
15:54:41.273736 close(1023)             = -1 EBADF (Bad file descriptor)
15:54:41.273828 close(1022)             = -1 EBADF (Bad file descriptor)
15:54:41.273901 close(1021)             = -1 EBADF (Bad file descriptor)
etc...

i have an strace output generated during the peaks, if you're interested i
can mail it to you (27mb) or a portion of it.

i've even tried a 2.6.1 kernel to see if it had any effect, but it didn't,
untill i did see that a debian3 was having the same problem but less
intensive then a slack9. the major difference between those distro's is
the gcc version 2.95.x <> 3.2.2. compiling qpopper with gcc 2.95.x did not
have any effect on the slack boxes.


bart

On Tue, Jan 20, 2004 at 03:45:49PM -0800, The Little Prince wrote:
> I have heard of any performance problems with my patch. People have 
> reported really good perf. with thousands of users.
> Nobody has reported anything with radius auth. used at the same time.
> Not being able to test any other cases, e.g. local auth. and maildir, 
> radius, and mbox, etc.. doesn't help you.
> Like Clifton said, check your stats. Watch vmstat statistics.
> Even strace some of the processes to see what calls they spend the most 
> time in.
> 
> --Tony
> .-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.
> Anthony J. Biacco                            Network Administrator/Engineer
> thelittleprince at asteroid-b612.org              http://www.asteroid-b612 dot org
> 
>        "You find magic from your god, and I find magic everywhere" 
> .-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-._.-.
> 
> On Tue, 20 Jan 2004, Clifton Royston wrote:
> 
> > On Mon, Jan 19, 2004 at 03:47:38PM +0100, Bart Dumon wrote:
> > > i'm running qpopper 4.0.5 on linux (2.4.x) with maildir patch 
> > > (0.12) and pam_radius for authentication. 
> > > 
> > > right now, i'm suffering from high cpu load averages once it's
> > > gets too busy the load will skyrocket to abnormal high values
> > > and the service will become unavailable untill it's restarted. 
> > > this typically happens during peak times when we receive 15 pop 
> > > sessions/sec.
> > > 
> > > at first it thought it was radius related because i'm seeing the
> > > following error message during the peak times:
> > > 
> > > Jan 19 14:07:41 xxx popper[13404]: pam_radius_auth: RADIUS server x.x.x.x failed to respond
> > > 
> > > but even with a more performant radius, the problem persists, it
> > > looks like the radius errors are a consequence of the problem and
> > > not the real cause.
> > > everything is pointing in the direction of the amount of pop sessions
> > > whenever you get to the 13-14pops/sec barrier, qpopper seems to
> > > be giving up. it's not traffic related because the amount of traffic
> > > is higher outside the peak hours.
> > 
> >   Usually this kind of overload is due to many users having large
> > mailboxes (e.g. 30MB and up) in the old UNIX mbox format.  In this
> > format, the file needs to be recopied to update the messages' status
> > when popped, which results in the POP sessions completely saturating
> > your disk I/O bandwidth.
> > 
> >   I have also seen some Radius daemons show a tendency to die under
> > this type of heavy load.
> > 
> >   I haven't seen reports of this with maildir format.  However, what
> > you're describing is consistent with I/O bandwidth saturation.
> > 
> >   If you are saturating your disk bandwidth, you'll see a large number
> > of concurrent tasks waiting to run ("load" as shown by the uptime
> > command or xload) but a high proportion of idle time shown by vmstat.
> > At that point you'll need to try to figure out why all this bandwidth
> > is still going on even with maildir format; I don't use that patch, so
> > I can't help with troubleshooting it.
> >   -- Clifton


Date: Wed, 21 Jan 2004 22:44:18 +0100
From: Bart Dumon <bart at crossbar dot net>
Subject: Re: qpopper high load average

Clifton,

On Tue, Jan 20, 2004 at 01:16:53PM -1000, Clifton Royston wrote:
> > 
> > right now, i'm suffering from high cpu load averages once it's
> > gets too busy the load will skyrocket to abnormal high values
> > and the service will become unavailable untill it's restarted. 
> > this typically happens during peak times when we receive 15 pop 
> > sessions/sec.
> > 
>   Usually this kind of overload is due to many users having large
> mailboxes (e.g. 30MB and up) in the old UNIX mbox format.  In this
> format, the file needs to be recopied to update the messages' status
> when popped, which results in the POP sessions completely saturating
> your disk I/O bandwidth.

i've ran qpopper 2.5x on a sparc system with 20k mailboxes, mailboxes
where up to 40mb in mbox format so i do recognize the situation. but 
my current problem is totally different. there's no recopying with
the maildir patch thus reducing I/O, which is probably it's biggest 
advantage for high volume sites.

>   I haven't seen reports of this with maildir format.  However, what
> you're describing is consistent with I/O bandwidth saturation.
> 
>   If you are saturating your disk bandwidth, you'll see a large number
> of concurrent tasks waiting to run ("load" as shown by the uptime
> command or xload) but a high proportion of idle time shown by vmstat.

that's absolutely true, see my sample in my mail to TLP.


bart
--


Date: Wed, 21 Jan 2004 17:09:31 -0600
From: David Champion <dgc at uchicago dot edu>
Subject: Re: qpopper high load average

* On 2004.01.20, in <215446068092100234368 at lists.pensive dot org>,
*	"Clifton Royston" <cliftonr at lava dot net> wrote:
> 
>   Usually this kind of overload is due to many users having large
> mailboxes (e.g. 30MB and up) in the old UNIX mbox format.  In this

Bart -

I've never run qpopper with the Maildir patch, so I don't have an
automatic sense of how to compare. And I'm not sure how much you should
expect from your particular server system with Maildir, either. I can
say, though, that once you start to hit the limits of your I/O system,
performance degrades very quickly. It's no longer linear, it's like you
take your foot off the accelerator, and the brakes come on in full.

I've been putting off a reply to see what others say, but I might
as well go ahead with mentioning that if it does seem to be a high
user-load problem, or if that seems like a good-enough temporary
solution, you might want to take a look at how we reduced that at my
site:

	http://home.uchicago.edu/~dgc/sw/qpopper/index.html

(I still have some contributed patches to apply to this -- for which I
apologize to their submitters -- but they don't affect basic operation.)

When our server first hit its I/O limits, we saw pretty much three
options: divide onto multiple servers, speed up the storage subsystem,
or slow down the users. The first two weren't good solutions for us at
the time, so we opted for forcing the users to stop hitting the server
so hard. Since then we've improved our I/O capacity and we will be
splitting onto multiple servers, but the rate-limiting we levied back
then helped us through the rough period.

-- 
 -D.    dgc at uchicago dot edu   **   Enterprise Network Servers and Such
                           **   University of Chicago
 We are the robots.        **   North America's southernmost seasonal glacier

Last updated on 21 Jan 2004 by Pensive Mailing List Admin