Setting up SMTP Mailing service

Setting up SMTP Mailing service Started by D.M. · July 03, 2024, 03:51:11 am · Read 12407 times 0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic. previous topic - next topic

Re: Setting up SMTP Mailing service

Reply #15 – July 10, 2024, 08:57:21 pm

Keep your notes, because at some point when it stops working, you'll want to get things configured "correctly" to be sure the problem isn't related to the "misconfiguration" that is "working anyway" at the moment..

Re: Setting up SMTP Mailing service

Reply #16 – July 14, 2024, 02:17:46 pm

Quote from: Steeley – July 10, 2024, 08:57:21 pmKeep your notes, because at some point when it stops working, you'll want to get things configured "correctly" to be sure the problem isn't related to the "misconfiguration" that is "working anyway" at the moment..

Got it ! Thanks for the heads up !

Re: Setting up SMTP Mailing service

Reply #17 – July 15, 2024, 11:54:35 am

Well, my happiness was shortlasting ! @Steeley was right , it doesnt work, now theres a new error but I think it's hosting related , I have no idea how the first mail even went through and how this error just popped up out of nowhere without changing anything in the smtp

stream_socket_enable_crypto(): Peer certificate CN=`s7.webhostingsrbija.rs' did not match expected CN=`smtp.sendgrid.net'

This is what Chat GPT has to say:
Understanding the Error
stream_socket_enable_crypto(): This PHP function enables encryption on a stream, typically for securing communications with SSL/TLS.
Peer certificate CN='s7.webhostingsrbija.rs': The Common Name (CN) in the SSL/TLS certificate presented by the SMTP server is s7.webhostingsrbija.rs.
did not match expected CN='smtp.sendgrid.net': The script expects the Common Name to be smtp.sendgrid.net, which means your ElkArte forum is configured to connect to SendGrid’s SMTP server, but the server it’s actually connecting to is presenting a certificate for s7.webhostingsrbija.rs.
Potential Causes
Misconfigured SMTP Settings: Your ElkArte forum might be configured with incorrect SMTP server details.
Man-in-the-Middle (MITM) Attack: While less likely, a MITM attack could be intercepting your SMTP connections and presenting a different certificate.
Proxy or Intermediate Server: Your hosting provider might be routing SMTP connections through an intermediate server which presents its own certificate.

what the heck ?

Re: Setting up SMTP Mailing service

Reply #18 – July 15, 2024, 09:48:34 pm

Try reading this: https://stackoverflow.com/a/64160785

Re: Setting up SMTP Mailing service

Reply #19 – July 16, 2024, 12:28:15 am

Quote from: ahrasis – July 15, 2024, 09:48:34 pmTry reading this: https://stackoverflow.com/a/64160785

If he's using sendgrid as his email server, I don't think that (cpanel smtp filtering thing) is going to help him @ahrasis

@Denis M. - first, let me ask what is wrong with using your own host's email system (why are you messing with sendgrid at all)?

(FWIW, that error is saying the security certificates are not OAUTH2 (I suspect) security compliant. But, why you are involving ChatGPT in this is beyond me.. let's get back to basic SMTP stuff, which still works in most everywhere, and start there.. )

Re: Setting up SMTP Mailing service

Reply #20 – July 16, 2024, 01:53:09 am

Did you read or not? Because the problem (which is mentioned just above the said answer) is exactly the same:

Quote from: https://stackoverflow.com/q/41554028We are attempting to send an autoresponder email to new members. We're using the same configuration on other sites on the same server with no issue. Upon sending the email the following error is returned:

Quotestream_socket_enable_crypto(): Peer certificate CN=cs723.mojohost.com did not match expected CN=smtp.sendgrid.net

Re: Setting up SMTP Mailing service

Reply #21 – July 16, 2024, 08:08:15 am

Quote from: Steeley – July 16, 2024, 12:28:15 am
Quote from: ahrasis – July 15, 2024, 09:48:34 pmTry reading this: https://stackoverflow.com/a/64160785

If he's using sendgrid as his email server, I don't think that (cpanel smtp filtering thing) is going to help him @ahrasis

@Denis M. - first, let me ask what is wrong with using your own host's email system (why are you messing with sendgrid at all)?

(FWIW, that error is saying the security certificates are not OAUTH2 (I suspect) security compliant. But, why you are involving ChatGPT in this is beyond me.. let's get back to basic SMTP stuff, which still works in most everywhere, and start there.. )

I want to use SendGrid because going through PHP just shoves the email into the spam folder, I need an SMTP setup since my hosting provider only supports registration/login/password reset emails and not ''You have a new reply on your post'' etc then they block your account

Quote from: ahrasis – July 16, 2024, 01:53:09 amDid you read or not? Because the problem (which is mentioned just above the said answer) is exactly the same:
Quote from: https://stackoverflow.com/q/41554028We are attempting to send an autoresponder email to new members. We're using the same configuration on other sites on the same server with no issue. Upon sending the email the following error is returned:

Quotestream_socket_enable_crypto(): Peer certificate CN=cs723.mojohost.com did not match expected CN=smtp.sendgrid.net

@Steeley @ahrasis It WORKED !

Just to update everyone that the problem was in the WHM settings (Cpanel) keep in mind I did not have access to those settings and I needed my hosting providers support to disable the ''SMTP Restrictions''

Though the email system is now working although theres a new problem regarding the email templates I will be posting a new topic about the issue

Thanks for all the help and support gentlemen, it means a lot !

Re: Setting up SMTP Mailing service

Reply #22 – July 16, 2024, 03:12:25 pm

QuoteI needed my hosting providers support to disable the ''SMTP Restrictions''

Ummmm... ok, however, it looks like you are using Sendgrid in addition to your hosts email server, which is redundant - and accomplishes little while doubling your failure exposure .. since you still had to have your host do some configuration anyway, right?

QuoteI want to use SendGrid because going through PHP just shoves the email into the spam folder, I need an SMTP setup since my hosting provider only supports registration/login/password reset emails and not ''You have a new reply on your post'' etc then they block your account

OK, now you have cornfused me greatly..

Let's look a little closer and dispel some of that confusion..

When mail is received by your host's email system, it just puts that email in the account incoming mail folder.... (in the image below there's 4 email accounts, forumtest@.., <blank>_forum@.., <blank>-forum@.., webmaster@..,). Folder "new" is the incoming mail folder for the <blank>_forum@.., addy below)

.
.
.
What happens to those emails after that is strictly up to whatever email processing is done on your end.. be it a client provided by your host ("webmail interface") or your own software client (outlook, ms mail, Pegasus Mail, etc..) or ElkArte's own software routine, and/or cron jobs. It doesn't automatically just jump into a "spam folder". (If you notice, there IS no spam folder since neither I nor my host has enabled spam filtering)

Quote ..PHP just shoves the email into the spam folder,

I'm not sure what spam folder you are referring to, but if it doesn't happen with email through SendGrid, but does using your host, that is your host's software doing something it shouldn't after the email is received, and that just needs to be disabled or fixed.. (if it isn't already!)

[If you were to look at one of those files it looks "exactly" like the "raw view" of the email envelope you would see if you selected that view rather than the "prettied up" view of the email you would see that is done by your email client, to show you just the sender, subject, date received, and content. The client software decides what to do and how to do it based upon its configuration and what it finds in the contents of that email file.
Likewise, ElkArte does it's own thing with email in whatever "folder" it is expecting email to reside in, based on EA's mail-handling configuration and what it finds in the account incoming email folder, in exactly the same way. It's not complicated (unless you make it so..) ]

The only reason I can see to use Sendgrid is if (a) you're going to be sending massive amounts of bulk emails that your host doesn't want to allow, or (b) your host is not co-operative/responsive to your mail configuration needs. (And your "Email Template" problem that you posted shows us why even that isn't a good reason to use Sendgrid.)

If it's the later reason (b), you'll be better off in the long run with a new host.. but it sounds like your host IS responsive ..

QuoteI needed my hosting providers support to disable the ''SMTP Restrictions''

...and apparently he did, and therefore he was... right?

I'm a big fan of "KISS" ... the fewer things that can go wrong, will usually result in fewer things going wrong. Redundancy doubles failure exposure and only improves reliability if the redundancy is in parallel - it sounds like your email redundancy is serial - that is, incoming mail has to go through SendGrid and then through your host's system,

It has to be incoming mail to Sendgrid then to your host email system anyway, then to ElkArte, otherwise, why would your host "turning off SMTP Restrictions" solve anything regarding received email?

{EDIT: And now you've discovered Sendgrid is munging up outbound email, because it's configured to "hide" your actual URL and server from your email recipients.. ☹]

Anyway, once the rest of your forum is operating the way you want, if not sooner, go back and look at this email thing and figure out why your host isn't capable of meeting your needs.. I'll bet you find the host actually is able to meet your needs (I would not be surprised if turning off the SMTP restrictions solved the "spam-folder" issue - that supposedly drove you to seek another solution - if it wasn't actually solved earlier), and SendGrid can be eliminated.

Re: Setting up SMTP Mailing service

Reply #23 – July 16, 2024, 05:15:07 pm

Quote from: Steeley – July 16, 2024, 03:12:25 pmI'm a big fan of "KISS" ... the fewer things that can go wrong, will usually result in fewer things going wrong.

As you discovered in the registration email you got and reported here.. I'm strongly suspecting that your decision to use Sendgrid instead of working with your host to resolve whatever problem you were having was made in haste, and, as you have now discovered, not the most elegant of solutions. I dare say it's only going to get worse.. (much worse) when you see what the forum emails look like

Below is an email copy of ahrasis earlier post.. what is circled in red is what Sendgrid is going to modify and 'cryptify'...

As I noted over in that other thread - you need to get rid of Sendgrid and fix the issue with your host email system (if the issue still exists..)

Re: Setting up SMTP Mailing service

Reply #24 – July 17, 2024, 01:10:42 am

Quote from: Steeley – July 16, 2024, 05:15:07 pm
Quote from: Steeley – July 16, 2024, 03:12:25 pmI'm a big fan of "KISS" ... the fewer things that can go wrong, will usually result in fewer things going wrong.

As you discovered in the registration email you got and reported here.. I'm strongly suspecting that your decision to use Sendgrid instead of working with your host to resolve whatever problem you were having was made in haste, and, as you have now discovered, not the most elegant of solutions. I dare say it's only going to get worse.. (much worse) when you see what the forum emails look like

Below is an email copy of ahrasis earlier post.. what is circled in red is what Sendgrid is going to modify and 'cryptify'...

[attach width=300 align=left]10742[/attach]

As I noted over in that other thread - you need to get rid of Sendgrid and fix the issue with your host email system (if the issue still exists..)

Well thats an amazing elaboration Steeley! and you are right ! I am using SendGrid only because mass emailing through my host will get me blocked as they advised me, but since I wont be having like hundreds of emails being sent and the forums have only 1 member at the current moment which is me I cannot expect a lot of emails going through!

You offer a good point, but how would one go on with setting up the mail system so it doesn't go through PHP ? or does it need to go through PHP if I decide to use my hosting provider as the email server ?

I am providing a screenshot of my hosting mailbox information below, since these mailing systems confuse me a bit, should this be the information entered for SMTP ?

Thanks for the advice ! I started another Topic about the HTML problems with emails Ill be replying Here

Re: Setting up SMTP Mailing service

Reply #25 – July 17, 2024, 01:47:43 pm

Set up the email account(s) for your foum on your host like you would any other type of email account.

You will want at least an account for elkArte to use to send and receive emails (copies/notifications of forum posts, newsletters, whatever..), and one for webmaster communications. If you are going to allow Post By Email, that will be a different set of issues, let's crawl before trying to stand and run..

Now, go into ElkaArte Admin and configure communications to use each account.

That's all you have to do.

If it doesn't work right, or at all, then debug the EA configuration, and/or figure out what's going on with the host SMTP email handling.

It's been more than 5 years now since I set up email communications with ElkArte so I'm going to have to think/look back, but as I recall, this part was very simple. (What took some trickery was the fact that I have about 20 "boards" and PBE, and some fun cron jobs running to make that work). I think I had to work with spuds a bit to resolve some legacy issues in the php sendmail (EA v 1.16), but those have been corrected in later releases..

The only time I've ever had any issues with sending and receiving email with EA is when my host's email servers were "updated " and the new configurations broke the process, that my host had to go back in and fix..
So, make sure you have your own separate "user" (in addition to admin or "webmaster" account) and email addy for it, so you can "test" what your users will see, but more important, see when stuff just mysteriously stops working and know your host just did something to the email server!

Forget Sendgrid, don't worry about anything re: php unless your testing shows there's a problem there, and if you can't figure that out, come to us and we can focus on solving the problem rather than finding a suitable bandaid or work around that nobody has ever used before..

Your host's email doesn't know or care where on the server domain EA resides, and EA doesn't care where it is either - mydomain.com/forum, or forum.mydomain.com/forum, it doesn't matter when it comes to email handling. EA just needs to know the email account addy, and credentialing to get into it. The host's email has no idea where the account access attempt is coming from(*), just needs to know it had the right credentialing.

*exception: there's some handshaking and checks that now goes on between the SMTP email server and the accessing "client" (EA in this case) for security purposes, but that should be moot if EA is on the same box as the server - there should be no 'security 'handshaking" you have to worry about in that situation.

What I recommend is to close down this thread, and the Email template thread, then start over - reconfigure your installation for local host email, and create a new email thread if you run into problems, based on resolving the problem, not trying to configure the workaround attempt. Trust EA to work as intended "out of the box" and don't try to deal with theoretical problems unless you actually encounter them. If they do manifest, then fix it, rather than try to sidestep it.

Oh, and unless there's a very good reason to operate in a subdomain, don't complicate things unnecessarily.

[EDIT: I believe C-Panel softaculous has listserve support/ties at the server level, which may (or may not) be an easier/more elegant solution if your forum becomes so successful it outgrows your host's email volume tolerance. But worry about dealing with that problem only if you actually encounter it.