Suddenly not getting "New User" emails

Started by Dragon41673, April 19, 2015, 05:47:43 PM

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Dragon41673

Both myself, and the global mod accounts on my forum are not getting the email notifications that a new user has registered. I just noticed this today in the "Latest Member" area of the stats...so I wen to look, seems the last person I got notification of registration was about 2-3 weeks ago roughly, and since then, I've had roughly 8 new users without getting the notifications!

I haven't really changed anything on the site during that time frame except for some permissions of the regular users & the mods. I went to double check that both myself & the global mod have the correct permissions checked, and I do have "Notify administrators when a new member joins" selected...so I'm not sure what else to do.

Could someone please give me some direction?

Thank you very much
Owner - Aries Games & Miniatures

Night09

Do you use php default or an external mail provider? If you send a lot through the host it could be marked as spam.

We need to know more about the mail config and related mods to help more.

Dragon41673

Neither my account or the Global Moderators account has these emails in the spam folder (it was the first thing I checked).

The mail setting is set as PHP Default...image attached if more info is needed.

Would it be better to setup as SMTP to avoid the spam folder or would that not matter?
Owner - Aries Games & Miniatures

Night09

On default its normally a host side problem as it relies on the servers post system. It is possible the host changed something and it has effected mail if those settings are as they are.

It may be worth pinging them a mail first before pulling things apart to be sure its definitely not their end of it.  What kind of post volume is average for your forum?

You may need to use the queue to slow it down a bit if its flooded the host and they reacted by stopping the mail sending.

SMTP can be used as long as you have an account to fill the details for it correctly set up. I use SMTP with gmail on my forums but its personal choice really.

Dragon41673

Well, I'm a new person to all this webadmin stuff, so this has been a big learning experience for me when I had to take over for my previous webmaster...

How would I "ping them a mail" to test our your theory?

Post volume is low, but has increased over the last year. I'd say on average, 5-10 posts a day except for a few odd days when a topic gets controversial! LOL

My main email is a gmail account, do you think it would be best to set that up? I ask because on my sales site and my forums, Hotmail users NEVER get emails from the system, and they don't end up in their spam folders. So any password resets have to be sent to me directly so I can do it manually for them. I know this is an issue between Hotmail & GoDaddy because EVERYONE else gets them including myself (I've tested it over & over)...but I guess it's possible that this issue could be expanding.

I'm planning on switching hosts in a couple months to SiteGround due to numerous recommendations from others as well as some major sites using them including my sales site's software manufacture.

Thank you very much
Owner - Aries Games & Miniatures

Night09

If the post count is 10 a day its nowhere near enough for flood controls. There shouldnt be a reason not to send unless A you made changes but it looks ok to me or B they made changes.

If your with Godaddy contact their support desk first and ask why no mail can be sent. See what they come back with and then it may be resolved or a reason from them why it has changed.  Godaddy isnt the best host around for sure so dont hold your breath. ;)

If you go the Gmail route ideally make a new account just for the forums.

Dragon41673

Quote from: Night09 on April 19, 2015, 07:25:41 PM
Godaddy isnt the best host around for sure so dont hold your breath. ;)

Preaching to the choir here man! LOL

Thank you for the advice...I will give them a call first as I do have error logs turned on that they can check.
Owner - Aries Games & Miniatures

Dragon41673

Well...after several days of trying Tech Support...I finally got someone that knew what they were doing.

Turns out, the emails for new users are being blocked at the host server level due to an attach done against GoDaddy (supposedly). They tried editing on their end the string that shows up as the subject line for new users, buy adding "today" at the end of the subject string...and it came through. So a one word change is needed...but I asked what they plan on doing about it because if for some reason that specific file is updated with a software update to SMF...it will go back to being blocked. So...supposedly they are going to look in to releasing that block.

We shall see...

Marking this topic solved since it's not a SMF issue and I understand how to "band-aid" it.
Owner - Aries Games & Miniatures

Night09

At least you have a way round it but im still wondering why this block is there to begin.

Dragon41673

Quote from: Night09 on April 26, 2015, 04:10:32 PM
At least you have a way round it but im still wondering why this block is there to begin.

Supposedly they were attacked with a heavy load of the same subject line as the new user email that goes out from SMF. Due to that, they blocked those exact words in that exact arrangement. By adding a single word (they used the word "today") anywhere within the subject line...it went through. Hopefully I will hear back, but I don't think it matters much anyways (at least for me), as I will be dropping them as a host in May and moving over to Siteground.
Owner - Aries Games & Miniatures

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