The mail man is on strike

[Zirkon]

I have been fighting with a mail problem for some weeks now and getting no where. Cannot seem to find any topics here with any resolves. So here it is.

When sending a newsletter either by PM or Email only early members of the forum receive them. After a ways down the members list they get blank PM's and/or emails.

It's happening with all email providers.
Didn't copy/paste the content with Word.
Get the same results whether sending via the PHP or SMTP options. (SMTP setting have been provided by the host)
Sending by either newsletter PM version only or HTML only has the same issue.
Did a file refresh/install and it still happens.

Sending forum emails and PM's works fine.

Host says no problem on there end. I trust that as all is fine on my other site. All Newsletters and regular mail is readable.


This is just an issue with the Newsletter bulk send only.
Currently using SMF 2.0.11

With the file refresh/install/big upgrade method most of my files have been replaced. That leaves me with the settings files and the database.

Any ideas how to troubleshoot this or what to look for?

[Siirist]

Hi,

It may be that the settings are set that they are not getting the announcements (aka newsletters)

See attached screen shots

Be Well,
Siriist

[Zirkon]

Hi,

It may be that the settings are set that they are not getting the announcements (aka newsletters)

See attached screen shots

Be Well,
Siriist

That's not the problem. As I stated they receive blank newsletters by PM or email. The newsletter title is all they can read. The body of the message is blank.

If they aren't enrolled in newsletters they get nothing. That part works fine. The problem is with those that actually want the newsletter get blanks.

In hopes someone has an answer.

[Zirkon]

Just an update I looked through the settings files BAK & PHP and cannot find anything in them that would cause this issue. Think it might be database related but have no idea how to figure it out.

[Zirkon]

Does anyone know if there is a limit or glitch in SMF for the size/amount of mail in the database? I have some members that use the PM system heavily for chatting. You always see them sending back n forth on Who's Online. The past newsletters have been sent via PM also. Thinking maybe all that mail clogging up the database might be causing this issue. It's a shot in the dark at this point.

I remember reading on here that after a certain amount of posts there was a glitch in SMF that you had to mend. Not sure if that is still a current issue or not. Think it was generating blank posts when it happened but my memory is foggy.

Are there any support people here that specialize in the mail function of SMF?

[Sir Osis of Liver]

What are your mail queue settings? 

[Zirkon]

These are the current settings.

Maximum emails to send per minute: 5
Maximum amount of emails to send per page load: 2

I have tried it with and without the queue. Never had a problem with the setting before.

[Sir Osis of Liver]

How many are you sending?  It's odd that members receive the emails, but they're blank.  Nothing to do with settings, and mail is working if emails are sent.  Don't see how it could have anything to do with database.

[Zirkon]

Just over 4000. I'm just guessing it's database related.  None of my mods are mail related.

I'm all eyes at this point. Appreciate your response to this thread. Thank you.

[Sir Osis of Liver]

This problem has been reported previously, with no resolution -

http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=542565.msg3855252#msg3855252

I've posted an inquiry on team board, will see if anyone has a clue.

[Zirkon]

  Thank you very much.

[nend]

Hi,

Since this function is handled by JavaScript form re-submission, the problem may be caused by conflicting JavaScript code installed on your website or even by your very own web browser.

I ask that you provide any environmental details below, like what browser your using and any plugins installed such as ad blocking software.

Can you also provide any details of any scripts you may have installed, we are particularly looking for anything JavaScript related.
Examples of these can be
* AJAX, scripts that do things without a page reload.
* Advertising network ad codes.
* DOM modifying scripts that add things to the page.

Any script that does anything to the post window, is especially interesting as this is the same input name used in the JavaScript portion of the Newsletters script.

Also please provide a link to your site, this would help greatly with the troubleshooting process.

Thanks,

[Zirkon]

The browser I use is Firefox.
Java on my computer was out of date but not enabled or installed in Firefox. Has been that way for some time.

Adblocker plugins were:
Adblock Edge      2.1.9.1
Disconnect      3.15.3.1

Forum Mods installed at time of issue were:

• Users Online Today 2.0.1
• SMFPacks Likes Pro Mod    1.3.8
  
• Add Facebook Like, Tweet, and Google +1    1.0.3a
• Stop Forum Spam 1.0
• SMF Links 2.5.3
• More Spiders 1.2
• Invitation Message In Your Face (IMIYF) 0.3.1
• Join date and Location in Posts 1.3
• SMF Theme Changer 1.0.1
• Tapatalk SMF 2.0 Plugin 4.1.1
• Allow Deny Boards 1.0 
• Ohara YouTube Embed 1.1
• Regular smileys to dark background smiley set 1.0
• Enhancements to recent posts 2.0.5 

I also was running BlueImpsAjaxChat It was removed when I refreshed the SMF files.

At the time I was running SMF 2.0.9 now running 2.0.11 still having the newsletter issue.
Tapatalk has been updated to the current version 4.3.9
SMF Theme Changer has not been re-installed
Invitation Message In Your Face (IMIYF) has not been re-installed
More Spiders has not been re-installed

Theme changes and chat is now being handled by Simple Portal

All said and done it still is happening.

Is it okay if I send my sites link via PM? Rather not put it out in the open.

[Zirkon]

Looking around it happened to this fellow to somewhat recently http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=543304.0

We share some similar modifications if it helps any.

[nend]

Since the newsletters portion is done via JavaScript I would recommend disabling the ad block plugins for your web site. However I don't believe this to be the root of the problem.

Can I have you edit...

In Sources/ManageNews.php
Find

Code Select Expand

// Save the message and its subject in $context
$context['subject'] = htmlspecialchars($_POST['subject']);
$context['message'] = htmlspecialchars($_POST['message']);

Replace with

Code Select Expand

// Save the message and its subject in $context
$context['subject'] = $smcFunc['htmlspecialchars']($_POST['subject']);
$context['message'] = $smcFunc['htmlspecialchars']($_POST['message'], ENT_QUOTES);

After the edits go ahead and give it another try and report back if this solved the issue for you.

I have a hunch that this is the problem.

[Sir Osis of Liver]

Wouldn't that affect all emails? OP and other poster reported that some emails are complete, others are empty.

[Zirkon]

Edited.

Waiting for it to work its way through the queue. Hope this works.

I received the email to my admin account being at the top of the list. All content was there, as has been, it's just when it gets further down the list the problem starts. Will see what happens.

[nend]

Wouldn't that affect all emails? OP and other poster reported that some emails are complete, others are empty.

It only affects emails sent via the Newsletter form in the Administration Center, other email notifications run a bit differently as they are database driven.

Edited.

Waiting for it to work its way through the queue. Hope this works.

I received the email to my admin account being at the top of the list. All content was there, as has been, it's just when it gets further down the list the problem starts. Will see what happens.

You should keep the browser sitting on the page in the Administration Panel or the Que will not be processed. If the Que stops before completing then there is something else wrong.

*edit @ Zirkon, disregard what I typed above, must of misread your post.

[Sir Osis of Liver]

It only affects emails sent via the Newsletter form in the Administration Center, other email notifications run a bit differently as they are database driven.

What I meant was, shouldn't all emails be blank.  Users are reporting that some recipients get the complete email, while others receive an empty email, all in same batch.

[nend]

It only affects emails sent via the Newsletter form in the Administration Center, other email notifications run a bit differently as they are database driven.

What I meant was, shouldn't all emails be blank.  Users are reporting that some recipients get the complete email, while others receive an empty email, all in same batch.

If the forum encoding is not UTF-8, when the first batch gets processed, the initial form submit it is submitted with the correct encoding. However since we are not using SMF's function here, if the PHP version is 5.4 or above then when htmlspecialchars gets called it converts the entities to UTF-8 to pass on to the form. Since the form is not UTF-8, from there on you have mismatched encoding which I believe is the cause.

*edit, I couldn't understand what I typed.