Hi, fetchmail-friends. I hope this is the appropriate list for this
question.
I have a problem that the connection to the server always times out
when using fetchmail, even though I can telnet to the server fine.
This has only started in the last few days, and it appears to be
limited to one of the two servers I habitually connect to. So it seems
that there is a component of the problem that is something to do with
the server. But I still don't really understand how telnet can work
but fetchmail fail.
=====
Here is the top of my .fetchmailrc:
poll pop.freeserve.net with proto POP3 timeout 30
user "sret1(_at_)adelie(_dot_)freeserve(_dot_)co(_dot_)uk" there with
password "*******" is sret1 here
user "analog(_at_)adelie(_dot_)freeserve(_dot_)co(_dot_)uk" there with
password "*******" is sret1 here fetchlimit 30
=====
I can telnet fine. The responses from the server appear immediately:
% telnet pop.freeserve.com 110
Trying 193.252.22.136...
Connected to pop.freeserve.com.
Escape character is '^]'.
+OK connected to pop3 on 3104
user adelie.freeserve.co.uk
+OK name is a valid mailbox
pass *******
+OK user exist with that password
stat
+OK 955 5586885
quit
+OK
Connection closed by foreign host.
=====
But fetchmail times out -- I think when trying to authenticate the
password. It times out even when I set a very long timeout interval.
After that, the mailbox is locked by the server and further
connection attempts (even by telnet) fail for a period of time.
% fetchmail -v -v
fetchmail: 6.2.5 querying pop.freeserve.net (protocol POP3) at Mon Mar 15
16:51:48 2004: poll started
fetchmail: POP3< +OK connected to pop3 on 3203
fetchmail: POP3> CAPA
fetchmail: POP3< -ERR unknown command
fetchmail: unknown command
fetchmail: Repoll immediately on
sret1(_at_)adelie(_dot_)freeserve(_dot_)co(_dot_)uk@pop.freeserve.com
fetchmail: POP3< +OK connected to pop3 on 3102
fetchmail: POP3> USER sret1(_at_)adelie(_dot_)freeserve(_dot_)co(_dot_)uk
fetchmail: POP3< +OK name is a valid mailbox
fetchmail: POP3> PASS *
fetchmail: timeout after 30 seconds waiting for server pop.freeserve.net.
fetchmail: socket error while fetching from pop.freeserve.net
fetchmail: 6.2.5 querying pop.freeserve.net (protocol POP3) at Mon Mar 15
16:52:29 2004: poll completed
fetchmail: Query status=2 (SOCKET)
fetchmail: 6.2.5 querying pop.freeserve.net (protocol POP3) at Mon Mar 15
16:52:29 2004: poll started
fetchmail: POP3< +OK connected to pop3 on 3204
fetchmail: POP3> CAPA
fetchmail: POP3< -ERR unknown command
fetchmail: unknown command
fetchmail: Repoll immediately on
analog(_at_)adelie(_dot_)freeserve(_dot_)co(_dot_)uk@pop.freeserve.com
fetchmail: POP3< +OK connected to pop3 on 3202
fetchmail: POP3> USER analog(_at_)adelie(_dot_)freeserve(_dot_)co(_dot_)uk
fetchmail: POP3< +OK name is a valid mailbox
fetchmail: POP3> PASS *
fetchmail: POP3< -ERR [IN-USE] Unable to lock maildrop
fetchmail: [IN-USE] Unable to lock maildrop
fetchmail: lock busy! Is another session active?
fetchmail: Lock-busy error on
analog(_at_)adelie(_dot_)freeserve(_dot_)co(_dot_)uk@pop.freeserve.com
fetchmail: POP3> QUIT
fetchmail: POP3<
fetchmail: lock busy on server error while fetching from pop.freeserve.net
fetchmail: 6.2.5 querying pop.freeserve.net (protocol POP3) at Mon Mar 15
16:52:35 2004: poll completed
fetchmail: Query status=9 (LOCKBUSY)
=====
My fetchmail is Debian 6.2.5-4. Here is the top of fetchmail -V:
This is fetchmail release 6.2.5+NTLM+SDPS+SSL+NLS
Fallback MDA: (none)
Linux gentoo 2.4.21 #1 Sun Nov 23 12:42:35 GMT 2003 i686 GNU/Linux
Taking options from command line and /home/sret1/.fetchmailrc
Idfile is /home/sret1/.fetchids
Fetchmail will forward misaddressed multidrop messages to sret1.
Options for retrieving from
sret1(_at_)adelie(_dot_)freeserve(_dot_)co(_dot_)uk@pop.freeserve.net:
True name of server is pop.freeserve.net.
Protocol is POP3.
All available authentication methods will be tried.
Server nonresponse timeout is 30 seconds.
Default mailbox selected.
Only new messages will be retrieved (--all off).
Fetched messages will not be kept on the server (--keep off).
Old messages will not be flushed before message retrieval (--flush off).
Rewrite of server-local addresses is enabled (--norewrite off).
Carriage-return stripping is disabled (stripcr off).
Carriage-return forcing is disabled (forcecr off).
Interpretation of Content-Transfer-Encoding is enabled (pass8bits off).
MIME decoding is disabled (mimedecode off).
Idle after poll is disabled (idle off).
Nonempty Status lines will be kept (dropstatus off)
Delivered-To lines will be kept (dropdelivered off)
Fetch message size limit is 100 (--fetchsizelimit 100).
Do binary search of UIDs during 9 out of 10 polls (--fastuidl 10).
Messages will be SMTP-forwarded to: localhost (default)
Single-drop mode: 1 local name(s) recognized.
No UIDs saved from this host.
=====
Thanks for any help in trying to understand this.
--
Stephen Turner, Cambridge, UK http://homepage.ntlworld.com/adelie/stephen/
"The internet is a reflection of our society. If we do not like what we see,
the problem is not to fix the mirror, we have to fix society." (Vint Cerf)