Troubleshooting

Enabling Safe Mode

By default, MailBee tries to take advantage of extended capabilities offered by mail servers. However, sometimes these extended features might not work properly despite the fact the mail server claims it supports them. The common reason for this is network antivirus, firewall or mail filter which may intercept the traffic between the mail server and the client. If it does not support any features supported by the mail server itself, this may cause problems.

MailBee allows the developer to disable any advanced features. To disable them all at once, set Global.SafeMode property to true before creating any instances or calling any methods of MailBee classes.

Logging the mail session into a file

Log file can be very useful for debugging any errors which occur during the session between the mail server and the client. Also, if you decided to contact our technical support for resolving the issue, you should also attach the log file. You can enable logging using Log property of any mailer component (including Smtp, Pop3 and Imap).

Testing with Microsoft Outlook Express

Often, the issue may be caused by your network configuration, not by the errors in the code. You should also try to do the same with Microsoft Outlook Express (OE). For instance, if you can't send a message, try to do the same with OE. But be sure to send from the same computer where you're using MailBee, using the same protocol and account settings (for instance, if the SMTP authentication is not used in MailBee, disable it in OE as well).

Even if the problem still does not get reproduced with OE, make sure your antivirus or firewall software (if any) does not treat OE in a special way. For instance, many security programs put OE on white list while unknown programs may get blocked.

Also, please note that you should test using Microsoft Outlook Express, not the full version (Microsoft Office Outlook). Microsoft Office Outlook can communicate with mail servers manufactured by Microsoft (such as Exchange) using internal protocols which are not supported by other software. As alternative to OE, you can also use Thunderbird.

Typical problems

Login errors often occur when the mail server expects the full e-mail address ("jdoe@domain") or full login name ("domain\jdoe") to be supplied as a login name while you supplied only login name ("jdoe"). The opposite scenario is also common: "jdoe" was expected while you supplied "jdoe@domain.com". Some mail clients automatically try both methods if any of them fails so that you may never know the login name you always used is actually incorrect and your mail client gets logged in on the second attempt only.
Sending to non-local e-mail addresses usually fails if SMTP authentication is not used. Most mail servers nowdays are configured to prohibit relay to external addresses for non-authenticated clients. See examples in Smtp.Send topic on how to enable SMTP authentication.
SSL errors typically occur on attempt to connect to a dedicated TLS/SSL port in StartTLS mode (or to a regular port in dedicated TLS/SSL mode). Changing value of SslMode property (available for SmtpServer, Pop3 and Imap classes) fixes the problem. For instance, if you set Pop3.SslMode to SslStartupMode.UseStartTls and tried to connect to a dedicated TLS/SSL port (995 for S/POP3), you'll be getting exceptions until you change Pop3.SslMode to SslStartupMode.OnConnect.

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