Author: vijayarelangovan

Sr IT Consultant. Helps clients to improve their IT infrastructure, Migrating to Azure, Office 365.

How to drop an email using telnet

Step 1. Telnet “Ip address or mx record” 25
Step 2. Ehlo (or) helo (or) ehlo domain.com
Step 3. mail from : youraddress@domainame.com (or) mail from : <youraddress@domainame.com>
Step 4. rcpt to : RecipientAddress@domainname.com (or) rcpt to : <RecipientAddress@domainname.com>
Step 5. data
Step 6. “Type the text”
Step 7. . (Period)

Message rejected due to unacceptable attachments – E2K7

Problem
When third party application or mails from the internet sends a message to your organisation, where you have Edge-Transport Server is receiving server, then You may get an NDR saying “Unacceptable Attachment”
Reason
The attachment sent by the application or by users in the internet may be listed in the AttachmentFilterEntry.
But in some cases the attachmet get rejected by Attachment Filter Agent, though its not listed in AttachmentFilterEntry
The reason being is that the attachment may not be recognised by the Attachment Filter Agent.  For example “.zip” file may get rejected by the Attachment filter Agent
This is a know issue and update rollup 5 wil fix this as per Microsoft.
*But even the a different attachment other than .zip can be rejected due to the same reason
Solution:
1. Install the recent rollup update
2. Add a key in the file EdgeTransport.exe.config file, under <appSettings>  </appSettings>
<add key=”AllowInvalidAttachment” value=”true” />

What you find in piple-line tracing for trouble shooting – E2K7

1. There would be 11 copies of each message
2. Message Header
Message header will be useful when the emails that are not in the proper format when sent and received from the server.  Since you have 11 copies of the message, you can compare the message header with other copy to see is there any change in the message header
3. Which Transport Agent fired at each stage
This will be very useful if the message message is not reaching the mail box.  If the message is not reaching the mailbox, it is obvious one of the Transport Agent would have rejected the mail.  This information will help us to find out which agent rejected the email
4. You can enable the piple line tracing for one user or all the users.  And it cannot be enabled on per domain basis

What do you know about Deframentation – Exchange server

  • Online deframentation – Does not reduce the physical size of the database · Offline Defragmentation – Reduces the physical size of the database ·
  • Online defragmentation runs for 15 minutes at the end of the database maintenance cycle (assuming that a task has completed).
  • By default, maintenance runs from midnight to 4 a.m.
  • When you run eseutil /d against a database to defragment it, the streaming file associated with the database is automatically defragmented. If you do not want the streaming file to be defragmented, include the /i option.
  • Time that the defragmentation will take will depend on the amount of white space in the database, as well as the size of the transactions recorded in the database, and your hardware specifications.

There are 11 task that is perfromed by online maintenance along with the defragmentation. They are

  1. Purge the indexes on the mailbox and public folder stores.
  2. Perform tombstone maintenance on mailboxes and public folders.
  3. Remove expired messages from the dumpster for the mailbox and public folder stores.
  4. Remove expired messages from public folders.
  5. Remove deleted public folders with tombstones over 180 days old.
  6. Clean up message conflicts within public folders.
  7. Update server version information on public folders.
  8. Check for and remove duplicate site folders on public folder stores.
  9. Clean up deleted mailboxes on mailbox stores.
  10. Check the message table for orphaned messages (messages with a reference count of 0).
  11. Perform an online defragmentation of the store.

POP3/IMAP4 service wont start after E2k7 SP1 Update

Issue:

Microsoft Exchange IMAP4/POP3 service does not start after installation/attempt install of SP1 Exchange server 2007, Additionally the following events are logged in the Application Log:

Event ID: 1000
Source : NET Runtime 2.0 Error Reporting
Type: Error
Description
Faulting application microsoft.exchange.imap4service.exe, version 8.1.278.2, stamp
481f7fea, faulting module kernel32.dll, version 5.2.3790.4062, stamp 462643a7,debug
0, fault address 0x000000000000dd10.

Event ID: 7009
Event Source: Service Control Manager
Event Type: Error
Description:
Timeout (30000 milliseconds) waiting for the Microsoft Exchange POP3 service to connect.

Cause:

The following dll files could be corrupted as a result of unsuccessful install of SP1

Microsoft.Exchange.imap4.exe.config
Microsoft.Exchange.imap4service.exe.config
Microsoft.Exchange.imap4.exe.config.bak
Microsoft.Exchange.imap4service.exe.config.bak
Microsoft.Exchange.Pop3.exe.config
Microsoft.Exchange.Pop3service.exe.config.
Microsoft.Exchange.Pop3.exe.config.bak
Microsoft.Exchange.Pop3service.exe.config.bak

Resolution:

From a different (working) E2K7 SP1 environment, we could copy the above-mentioned files from the
“C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\ClientAccess\PopImap”
(this is the default location, it could also be in a different location if customer has customized it)

Restart Microsoft Exchange Transport
Attempt to start POP3 and IMAP4, if the issue persists, reapply SP1 for exchange server 2007

gatewayProxy Vs GatewayProxy – E2K3

1. Difference between ‘gatewayProxy’ attribute on the Recipient Update Service object and ‘GatewayProxy’ attribute on the Recipient Policies object.

  • gatewayProxy is populated when the policy is applied and Recipient Update Service begins processing all the users who match the filter on the applied policy.
  • If the Recipient Update Service finishes processing the users successfully, it clears the corresponding entries from the gatewayProxy
  • If you clear the gatewayProxy attribute on the Recipient Update Service will not do anything, just helps the RUS to update the address to the object.

***If you clear the GatewayProxy attribute on the Recipient Policies will not do anything, it just stops the email flow. *** Do not try on the customer’s server.

2. Why the gatewayProxy on the Recipient Update Service is not cleared after the policy is applied?????

The possible reasons are:

  • When the Recipient Update Service or the Mad.exe process is killed or stops responding,  gatewayProxy attribute is not cleared because it has not completed processing the objects that apply to the policy.  Even when you restart the Recipient Update Service or the Microsoft Exchange System Attendant service(mad.exe) does not remove or clear the gatewayProxy attribute.
  • When Exchange System Manager and The System attendant (mad.exe) tries to access the gatewayProxy attribute at the same time

Link State Information – E2K3

LINK STATE TABLE

  • Link state table contains the following information

o   List of all Connectors      -> Name

o   Link status of the connectors      ->            Up/Down

o   Link cost of the connectors          ->            Value

  • Link state table information will be available with the Routing group master
  • The Routing Group Master will be communicating with the other exchange server to update the LST through the TCP port 691
  • The Routing Group Master will update the LST to the bridgehead server and bridgehead server sends the updated LST to the other bridgehead server in other routing group through TCP Port 25

Temp Table

What is use of Temp tables?

The Exchange Temp tables are special-purpose subfolders of the SMTP service’s logon to the Message Database. They are used for the creation of the bifurcated messages in the message categorizer, and as temporary storage for SendQ-submitted mail messages if SMTP cannot keep up with the processing of SendQ mail. When the SMTP service logs in to the Message Database, it forces an enumeration and submission of mail in the temp tables. So when we restart the Exchange server or restart the SMTP service, the mails in the temp tables will be resent.

Why the old messages are stuck in the queue?

  • An error occurs each time the particular message is processed. For

example, the Information Store may return a retry-able error when an

attempt is made to relay the message, or the connector to the message

destination is unavailable.

  • The message was categorized to go to a specific Message Database for

local delivery, but the Message Database is no longer available.

  • An unknown or unexpected behavior caused by message damage.

What are roles and responsibilities of temp table?

  • Act as a temporary Storage place for messages submitted via local Store Mailboxes while they are processed by Transport
  • Persisting messages for bifurcation (for content conversion, DL expansion).
  • Periodically removing messages from Send Queue (preventing “mail stuck in the Outbox” complaints).
  • Enumerated via asynchronous op on VS logon to MDB.
  • Can exist in every MDB for each virtual server to logon to it. Called TempTable#1, TempTable#2 etc… By default have 20 subfolders each for storing actual messages: configurable via

“HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Exchange\StoreDriver\Exchange\

instance#\TempTable” Registry value

Mail is not reaching the Inbox

In recent past, we had few cases with  “Incoming emails to the server does not reach the users inbox” problem.  In all the instances we were able to fix the problem with solution provided in this email.

Issue : Incoming emails to the server does not reach the users inbox

Solution : Follow the steps if the conditions are satisfied

Condition 1 :  Do is message tracking

Condition 2 :  If the email either in the Deleted items or Recover deleted items (Dumpster)

Step 1 : download and run the mfcmapi.exe

Step 2 : Follow these steps to delete the junk email rule

1.      Click Mfcmapi.exe

2.      Click Session -> click Logon And Display Store Table

3.      Choose the Profile Name -> click ok

4.      Click MDB -> Get Mailbox Table

5.      Double click on the user Mailbox

6.      Expand Top of information Store table

7.      Right Click on the inbox -> Open Assosicated Mailbox

8.      Right click on the Junk email rule ->Delete messages

Step 3 : Close the outlook of the user and reopen it again

Reason : The emails are routed to the Dumpster or the Deleted items due to the corrupted junk email rule installed by the IMF.

SMTP vs Memory

  • SMTP gateway servers use memory primarily for maintaining connections and keeping track of vital information about messages in the queues.
  • The memory used to store message properties on queued e-mail can be significant.
  • SMTP stores messages in the queue in two states:

1. opened (that it, it keeps a handle open) or

2. closed (that is, it closes the handle).

  • The maximum number of messages that an SMTP gateway queues before refusing new messages is 90,000.
  • SMTP can keep 1,000 messages in the queue open at any particular time, closing old messages as new ones arrive.
  • An open message in the queue consumes approximately 10 KB of memory in the Inetinfo process, and a closed message consumes approximately 4 KB of memory in the Inetinfo process.
  • The maximum number of messages that an SMTP gateway queues before refusing new messages is 90,000.
  • A simple calculation that explains this,

1,000 open messages = 10 MB of Inetinfo memory

1,000 open messages + 20,000 closed messages = 80 MB of Inetinfo memory

1,000 open messages + 89,000 closed messages = 366 MB of Inetinfo memory

Traffics:

  • Low-traffic SMTP gateway servers can perform adequately with 256 MB of RAM.
  • In high-traffic data centers, where large queues are common and large distribution lists are expanded, at least 512 MB of RAM is preferred.
  • Generally, an SMTP gateway server does not benefit by having more than 1 GB of memory.

Which means that at any given point of time, any Exchange server with basic configuration is capable of handling emails of any size.