In your message dated: Tue, 06 Feb 2001 18:51:12 EST,
your pithy ruminations on <Re: fetchmail hangs when retreiving mail> were:
=> Chip Salzenberg <chip(_at_)valinux(_dot_)com>:
=> > According to bergman(_at_)panix(_dot_)com:
=> > > I've been seeing a problem with fetchmail where it will hang when
=> > > trying to retrieve some messages from the server. This has
=> > > happened with multiple messages, with different versions of
=> > > fetchmail, and with POP3 and IMAP protocols. The problem is
=> > > intermittent, and seems to be dependent on the message (headers)
=> > > content.
=> >
=> > Likewise. I brought up this issue months ago. Nobody could reproduce
=> > it using different servers, so it never got fixed or even diagnosed.
=>
=> I know this is going to sound like a cop-out, but the few previous times
=> I've chased down stuff like this it has generally turned out to be a
=> low-level networking screw or some individual bogus server.
My experience doesn't point to a networking or server issue. The problem has
manifested itself on different versions of fetchmail and sendmail (most
recently fetchmail 5.6.0 and sendmail 8.11.1).
I've seen occasional hangs retrieving mail from a particular server. However:
stopping and restarting fetchmail has no affect
changing the protocol to or from IMAP to POP3 has no affect
changing the connection method from SSL to an ssh tunnel has
no affect (less extensively tested)
sendmail logs show that the (envelope) headers are transferred, but then
sendmail consistently times out waiting for the body
changing sendmail or fetchmail's timeout has no affect
there's no problem at all viewing/saving/deleting the first spooled
message via another mail client (Netscape or StarOffice's IMAP client)
other users on the same network are not having problems with that mail
server
once the first message in the queue is removed, fetchmail works
correctly
I know this is very hard to diagnose, but the points I noted above are quite
consistent. I've probably gone through the above sequence of events 5 times in
the last 9 months. That's not a lot (given the volume of mail I deal with), but
it's enough to suggest a real pattern, rather than a succession of random
"cosmic ray" events.
The real variable is what actually causes the hang in the first
place. I suspect it's somehow related to the content of the message--probably
the message (not envelope) headers.
If this does happen again, I'll save the offending message.
Mark
=>
=> It's *hard* to hang fetchmail from the inside. I wouldn't know how to
=> do it if I were actively trying -- the processing path is pretty simple.
=> --
=> <a href="http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/";>Eric S. Raymond</a>
=>
=> Militias, when properly formed, are in fact the people themselves and
=> include all men capable of bearing arms. [...] To preserve liberty it is
=> essential that the whole body of the people always possess arms and be
=> taught alike, especially when young, how to use them.
=> -- Senator Richard Henry Lee, 1788, on "militia" in the 2nd Amendment
=>
--
Mark Bergman Biker, IATSE #1 Stagehand, Rock Climber, Unix mechanic
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bergman(_at_)panix(_dot_)com
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