Hi,
I've been updating my sources over the last couple of weeks as I work to set up my own BBS on my RPi4. I have notice in the latest build of 3.18. Local BBS E-mail is no longer exchanged between users. This was functional before for me. No errors are thrown to either the sender or receiver; however, the receiver does receive the pop-up notification that they have received new mail from the sender, but they are not prompted to read it now. If the receiver attempts to check their mail, there is no new email message items.
The console doesn't appear to be throwing any errors. I've built from CVS and from tarballs on both RPi4 with Debian 10 based Raspberry Pi OS, as well as from both CVS and tarballs on a Debian 10 based x64 VM.
I'm still learning SBBS and would be happy to provide more details. This was not an issue on earlier builds.
Re: Local BBS E-Mail Issue (Latest Build of 3.18)
By: WitNik to All on Fri Jul 31 2020 02:45 pm
Hi,
I've been updating my sources over the last couple of weeks as I work to set up my own BBS on my RPi4. I have notice in the latest build of 3.18. Local BBS E-mail is no longer exchanged between users. This was functional before for me. No errors are thrown to either the sender or receiver; however, the receiver does receive the pop-up notification that they have received new mail from the sender, but they are not prompted to read it now. If the receiver attempts to check their mail, there is no new email message items.
Try using the ;mail sysop command or the smbutil program to examine your mail base (data/mail.*) and see what's going on.
The console doesn't appear to be throwing any errors. I've built from CVS and from tarballs on both RPi4 with Debian 10 based Raspberry Pi OS, as well as from both CVS and tarballs on a Debian 10 based x64 VM.
I'm still learning SBBS and would be happy to provide more details. This was not an issue on earlier builds.
Just need more details about what's going on with your data/mail base first. Maybe run chksmb on it, examine permissions, etc.
Re: Local BBS E-Mail Issue (Latest Build of 3.18)
By: Digital Man to WitNik on Sat Aug 01 2020 12:19 pm
Re: Local BBS E-Mail Issue (Latest Build of 3.18)
By: WitNik to All on Fri Jul 31 2020 02:45 pm
Hi,
I've been updating my sources over the last couple of weeks as I work to set up my own BBS on my RPi4. I have notice in the latest build of 3.18. Local BBS E-mail is no longer exchanged between users. This was functional before for me. No errors are thrown to either the sender or receiver; however, the receiver does receive the pop-up notification that they have received new mail from the sender, but they are not prompted to read it now. If the receiver attempts to check their mail, there is no new email message items.
Try using the ;mail sysop command or the smbutil program to examine your mail base (data/mail.*) and see what's going on.
When using ;mail sysop command I can see the sent local mail. It looks intact and normal.
smbutil l /sbbs/data/mail shows the following:
SMBUTIL v2.34-Linux (rev 1.136) SMBLIB 2.61 - Synchronet Message Base Utility
Opening /sbbs/data/mail
1 WitNik WitNik Local Test
2 Boba Fett WitNik New User Validation
3 WitNik Boba Fett Welcome to My BBS!
4 Boba Fett Boba Fett Testing Email To Self
5 Boba Fett WitNik Feedback Test
The console doesn't appear to be throwing any errors. I've built from CVS and from tarballs on both RPi4 with Debian 10 based Raspberry Pi OS, as well as from both CVS and tarballs on a Debian 10 based x64 VM.
I'm still learning SBBS and would be happy to provide more details. This was not an issue on earlier builds.
Just need more details about what's going on with your data/mail base first. Maybe run chksmb on it, examine permissions, etc.
There doesn't appear to be anything wrong with perms. Here's a directory listing:
-rw------- 1 bbs bbs_sysops 21 Aug 1 21:31 mail.0.ini
-rw-r--r-- 1 bbs bbs_sysops 0 Aug 1 21:54 mail.0.sdt
-rw------- 1 bbs bbs_sysops 32 Aug 1 21:31 mail.0.shd
-rw-r--r-- 1 bbs bbs_sysops 0 Aug 1 21:54 mail.0.sid
-rw------- 1 bbs bbs_sysops 384 Aug 1 21:49 mail.hash
-rw------- 1 bbs bbs_sysops 21 Aug 1 21:31 mail.ini
-rw------- 1 bbs bbs_sysops 10 Aug 1 21:49 mail.sda
-rw------- 1 bbs bbs_sysops 1069 Aug 1 21:49 mail.sdt
-rw------- 1 bbs bbs_sysops 10 Aug 1 21:49 mail.sha
-rw------- 1 bbs bbs_sysops 2592 Aug 1 21:49 mail.shd
-rw------- 1 bbs bbs_sysops 100 Aug 1 21:49 mail.sid
Thank you for taking the time to write back to me. I wanted to give you an update on this issue. I believe that it does still exist, but only on new clean installations.
Here is what I did to solve the issue:
1. Installed SBBS 3.17b from tarballs on RPi and x64 Debian 10.
2. Logged in and created SysOp Account and Guest Account..
3. Logged in and created an additional user account.
4. Tested local BBS (non-Internet/Network) mail and everything worked.
5. Used SBBS Wiki instructions and CVS and sync'd to the latest source.
6. Performed a clean rebuild according to SBBS Wiki.
7. Launched SCFG to fix cipher/cert issues.
8. Relaunched SBBS and the mail functions normally.
9. Added an additional user account and tested again and mail
functions normally.
This leads me to believe that there is still an issue with the way the local mail data files are initialized on a clean build. It is also quite possible that I am missing a critical setup step. Again, if I build from the latest source without an existing populated mail file it does not produce an error on send, and the receipt is notified of the new message from the sender, but is not prompted to read the message. Subsequent manual mail checks indicate no new mail available. Almost like the email is never written to disk, but the aforemented tests that you had me run shows that it is being written and is accessible to certain functions and smbutil.
Thank you for all that you do!
Was the mail sent to a local or network address? Is the mail marked as having been read or sent or deleted? More information would be helpful.
And which of those emails was the one you're having a problem with? Using the 'smbutil v' command to view the header of the message(s) that you had or having a problem with and pasting that output here would be helpful.
And I assum the BBS is running as 'bbs'.Yes, bbs is the user account that runs SBBS.
Yeah, is it possible the email was simply forward to a networked mail address and thus no longer readable on the BBS?
Re: Local BBS E-Mail Issue (Latest Build of 3.18)
By: Digital Man to WitNik on Sat Aug 01 2020 10:17 pm
Was the mail sent to a local or network address? Is the mail marked as having been read or sent or deleted? More information would be helpful.
The mail is all local mail only that is sent by me to other test account. I've tried following validation/feedback workflows, as well as sending directly or sending messages to the user's own alias or account number.
SMBUTIL v2.34-Linux (rev 1.136) SMBLIB 2.61 - Synchronet Message Base Utility
Opening /sbbs/data/mail
last_msg =5
total_msgs =5
header_offset =32
max_crcs =0
max_msgs =0
max_age =0
attr =0000h
And which of those emails was the one you're having a problem with? Using the 'smbutil v' command to view the header of the message(s) that you had or having a problem with and pasting that output here would be helpful.
This issue occurs on all messages sent. The receipt get's notified that they have been sent mail, but aren't prompted to read it. If the receipient tries to manually read their messages from the menu they are told there are no messages.
And I assum the BBS is running as 'bbs'.Yes, bbs is the user account that runs SBBS.
Yeah, is it possible the email was simply forward to a networked mail address and thus no longer readable on the BBS?
I don't have any of that setup yet, but I didn't think that was possible with local mail when the users have email forwarding disabled. Also, per my posted workaround, if I install 3.17b and perform these same tests everything works. Then if I upgrade to latest build it continues to work when new mail is sent. All old mail is still accessible. Weird?
Your mail base is missing the "mail" attribute flag. That 'attr' value should look like this:
attr =0001h
You can set the attribute with the "smbutil c" command. If it's not automatically set for a newly-created mail base, that would be a bug.
It's quite likely that mismatch attribute flag. Your 'mail' base is set as a sub-board for some reason and sub-boards have their message indexed differently. That could definitely cause a problem like you're describing. Just sounds like a new bug (regression) introduced after the v3.17b release. I appreciate the detailed report and trouble-shooting you've performed. Very helpful.
Re: Local BBS E-Mail Issue (Latest Build of 3.18)
By: Digital Man to WitNik on Sat Aug 01 2020 11:07 pm
Your mail base is missing the "mail" attribute flag. That 'attr' value should look like this:
attr =0001h
Out of curiousity, here's the diff between the clean lastest build and my workaround system using smbutil:
CLEAN LATEST BUILD:
bbs@raspberrypi:/sbbs/data $ /sbbs/exec/smbutil c /sbbs/data/mail
SMBUTIL v2.34-Linux (rev 1.136) SMBLIB 2.61 - Synchronet Message Base Utility
Opening /sbbs/data/mail
Last Message =5 New Value (CR=No Change):
Header offset =32 New value (CR=No Change):
Max msgs =0 New value (CR=No Change):
Max crcs =0 New value (CR=No Change):
Max age =0 New value (CR=No Change):
Attributes =0 New value (CR=No Change):
bbs@raspberrypi:/sbbs/data $
WORKAROUND SYSTEM (Upgrade from 3.17b)
bbs@THEDUDE:~$ /sbbs/exec/smbutil c /sbbs/data/mail
SMBUTIL v2.34-Linux (rev 1.136) SMBLIB 2.61 - Synchronet Message Base Utility
Opening /sbbs/data/mail
Last Message =5 New Value (CR=No Change):
Header offset =32 New value (CR=No Change):
Max msgs =0 New value (CR=No Change):
Max crcs =0 New value (CR=No Change):
Max age =90 New value (CR=No Change):
Attributes =1 New value (CR=No Change):
bbs@THEDUDE:~$
You can set the attribute with the "smbutil c" command. If it's not automatically set for a newly-created mail base, that would be a bug. It's quite likely that mismatch attribute flag. Your 'mail' base is set as a sub-board for some reason and sub-boards have their message indexed differently. That could definitely cause a problem like you're describing. Just sounds like a new bug (regression) introduced after the v3.17b release. I appreciate the detailed report and trouble-shooting you've performed. Very helpful.
While this may be a bug, but it's been rad for me to get to work on this with you. I'm still new around here and to SBBS. The more I get to see of the SBBS underpinnings the more respect I have for the time you've put into it. Again, thank you for sharing your code and knowledge. I'm happy to help gather any other bits and pieces if you direct me to what you might need. I did end up flipping the attribute and while I can't read any mail that was previously sent, I can now send/receive local mail normally. The recipient is prompted and able to read the new messages. Also, the new messages are viewable after being read in the by reading mail off of the Electronic Mail Menu, so your attribute change seems to have also fixed the issue on the clean build.
It was indeed a bug. Its now fixed in CVS, so if you cvs-update and delete your data/mail.* files, it should then recreate them correctly (and any data/subs/* msgbases too).
digital man
| Sysop: | deepend |
|---|---|
| Location: | Calgary, Alberta |
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