How do I get the e-mail to notify people on new forum post?

[handruin]

How do I get the field (Email Addresses to Notify When there is a New Post) to send e-mails when new posts are made? Right now I've only entered one email address and nothing gets sent when a new post is made. I've added a screen capture to show the area I'm talking about under the admin section.

Under the vbulletin admin panel > forum manager > specific forum is a field to enter email addresses to notify on when there is a new post (labeled: Email Addresses to Notify When there is a New Post).

I've entered my own email address and tried testing the feature but the board does not e-mail. I've confirmed vbulletin is capable of sending emails in two ways...one being an instant notification which went through fine and two, I installed the mod to log e-mails and it works fine. I know the general e-mailing works fine, just not in this section.

[Steve Machol]

Make sure you have a valid webmaster's email address in your Admin CP settings and that there is only one address. Then try this:

Admin CP -> vBulletin Options -> Email Options -> Enable "-f" Parameter -> Yes

Then try the vB email functions. If it still doesn't work, then this is either a server and/or mailbox issue.

vB uses PHP's mail() function for all its email and uses the SMTP server specified in php.ini. If PHP and the mail server are configured correctly then email will work.

Since some email is working, you will need to view the mail logs on the server to see what happened to those emails that don't work. Once vB sends it to PHP it's in the hands of the server. If you are on a shared server you may need to ask your host to look through the logs for you.

Another thing to keep in mind is that many ISPs and mail clients are putting in very aggressive spam filters. It's possible these emails are being placed into a spam folder or are being filtered.

[handruin]

Hi Steve, thanks for the info...I'm still having some trouble with this so let me try to cover everything:

To start:
1.) Confirmed a valid webmater e-mail address
2.) Enable the "-f paramter" and retested, but this did not fix my issue.

Now, I went into managed products and enabled "Mail-Logging 1.0.0" from vbulletin.org (as I saw recommended in several other threads for debugging).

Next, I went into the admin panel > Diagnostics > Email
1.) I entered my own e-mail address into the field and sent a message.
2.) The logging utility captured the e-mail and the e-mail went through to my inbox successfully.

This confirms for me that e-mail is working through vbulletin (so I thought).

Next, I went into the specific forum that I want to be email on all new posts and threads.

admin panel > forum manager > feedback (which is my forum)

I entered the same e-mail address (my own) into both of the following fields:
Email Addresses to Notify When there is a New Post
and
Email Addresses to Notify When there is a New Thread

I went into the forum and posted a new thread...but no e-mail was sent. I checked the mail-log file (which had the previous diagnostic e-mail captured) but it has no recollection of any other e-mails being processed. So that leads me to believe the e-mail was never generated and never sent to my SMTP server.

Background info:

This host is internal to my company and is not a shared hosting environment. It relays e-mail to a corporate-wide SMTP server. I verified the SMTP configuration in the PHP.ini on the host and it seems correct. The information is the same as the SMTP server I've configured in the admin panel (which requires no username or password and is on the standard port 25).

Is there any other configuration that may have any relation to the notification fields? Do I need someone else to post a new thread for it to generate? We have a second VB license (and forum) on a different server within the company where this feature is working. The difference between the two hosts varies on OS. The problem host is running windows/IIS and the working host is running Linux/Apache... Could that be part of the problem? But I suspected not since the mail-log utility isn't even showing the e-mail in the first place...it's as if vbulletin never even generated it.

[Steve Machol]

How do you know 'no email was sent'? The only way to check this for sure is by viewing the server mail logs. If vB sends some email, it sends them all. It doesn't randomly choose to send some types of email and not others. The code doesnt work that way.

For troubleshooting email issues you can install this plugin which will log all vB emails to a file. This will tell you if vB is sending these emails or not:

http://www.vbulletin.org/forum/showthread.php?t=101629

[handruin]

Hi Steve,

Thanks for the url, but I did mention in my previous post that I used that exact mod to make my determination that the e-mail was not sent.

Now, I went into managed products and enabled "Mail-Logging 1.0.0" from vbulletin.org (as I saw recommended in several other threads for debugging).

In my steps in the previous post you can see I did before/after tests using the mail-logging mod. If I send a test e-mail via the admin board...it gets logged (as do instant notifications..those both work fine). If I try responding to a thread configured to use the notification field, no e-mail is logged in that the log file and no e-mail is received.

I have no access to our corporate email servers and i highly doubt they are the issue. If the forum is capable of sending the e-mail to my own address via "instant notifications" then there is no reason our e-mail servers would not deliver it if the same address is used in the " Email Addresses to Notify When there is a New Post" fields unless if vbulletin is improperly formatting the address some how (just speculative, but not likely). But there is no way of knowing because the mail-log utility doesn't capture anything in the latter situation.

I also don’t understand how one of my vbulletin forums functions correctly with this feature, and this one does not. Both use the EXACT same smtp mail server and I verified both have the exact same settings. The only major difference is one forum is IIS/windows and the other is Linux/apache… I even went through ALL the admin configurations to compare both forums…nothing seemed out of place.

[Steve Machol]

If I try responding to a thread configured to use the notification field, no e-mail is logged in that the log file and no e-mail is received.

You do know that you will not receive email notification when you reply, right?

Both use the EXACT same smtp mail server and I verified both have the exact same settings. The only major difference is one forum is IIS/windows and the other is Linux/apache…

There is a world of difference between Windows and Linux servers. And if you are using the same SMTL sever, then you've added a third server which complicates things even more. Which one is the problem - Windows or Linux?

Also since you have already admited that this works on one vB forum and not the other (with the same settings), this eliminates vB as being the cause. Otherwise you'd have the same problem on both servers.

[handruin]

No, I was not aware that with this one feature that I would not get a reply. My understanding is that it was to notify me via e-mail even on the creation of a "new thread" (new post I could see it not going through) in which it does not send an e-mail. Neither feature works, so that isn't my issue. Any new thread should send me an e-mail message according to the way the feature is described (please let me know if I've misunderstood).

Having the three servers doesn't complicate things in my situation; I think it makes it easier, actually. The SMTP server is by far the most consistent and well controlled environment of all three. It's used by the entire division, so I'm close to removing it from the symptom list. I know it's always possible, but I doubt it has any bearing on this issue since the e-mail never gets sent in the first place (according to the mail-log).

Yes, I'm fully aware windows and Linux are each a beast in their own right. The part I need to narrow down is how different does vbulletin act with PHP when comparing windows and Linux? What I'm not comfortable in agreeing with is that vbulletin being removed from the cause list. The problem exists under the windows environment, but the Linux platform works perfect. I'm not here to point fingers at vbulletin (I find it to be a great product), but it's possible there is an issue with vbulletin in conjunction with windows vs. with vbulletin on Linux...I'd suspect Linux is a more common platform among vbulletin users so maybe this problem has never come to light in development or testing, but that's only a guess. It may very-well be a specific PHP difference that vbulletin implements fine under Linux. I just don't think vbulletin can be ruled out yet.

What I can't understand is why all other emails work on the problematic windows system...but not these specific ones? I don't know the vbulletin code at all to guess where the email call is made for the notification fields vs. something like an instant email for a thread subscription. If you can tell me which files the email channels through I'll go through the code, but I didn't want to go that far without exhausting this channel.

[Steve Machol]

No, I was not aware that with this one feature that I would not get a reply.

The reason for this is that, rightly or wrongly, the Devs decided that when someone makes a post, they are aware that they made this post and do not need the email notification. Except for cases of split personalities, I think this is a fair assumption.

Email on new posts or threads are only sent of you have added your email address to the appropriate forum setting:

Admin CP -> Forums & Moderators -> Forum Manager -> Edit Forum -> Email Addresses to Notify When there is a New Post

or for Moderators:

Admin CP -> Forums & Moderators -> Show All Moderators -> Edit -> Receive Email When a New Post is Created

As for the rest of your comments, vB does not treat the diffiernet emails differently, EXCEPT for some emails that may be delayed if you have the mail queue turned on:

Admin CP -> vBulletin Options -> Email Options -> Use Mailqueue System -> Yes

If you do, I recommend setting this to 'No'.

[handruin]

The two loctions you listed are exactly where I have been putting them all along (I listed them in my first post).

Anyway, I think I figured it out, but it still perplexes me. It turns out the Mail Queue isn't working for those two fields only. Or at least, when I disable the mail queue feature the e-mails are being generated correctly. This issue only pertains to those two specific fields though because all the other types of e-mails (instant notifications, etc) worked fine even with the mail queue enabled. I don't really need the mail queue, but I'd still like to know why it doesn't work if you have any thoughts.