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e-mail problems?

« Reply #80 on 23/08/2007, 22:51 »
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I'm saying that ISPs invest in spam filters because they see it as a solution to ever increasing storage requirements
That still doesn't make any sense; storage is got to be significantly cheaper than spam prevention solutions.
Arthur
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« Reply #81 on 23/08/2007, 22:51 »
Quote from: nlewis65 on 23/08/2007, 22:36
Thats all well and good for larger businesses but for smaller 1 man band businesses it is not feasable.

Options for small businesses are improving. There are free online commerce software packages such as osCommerce (http://www.oscommerce.com/) for those who want to host their own website. And there is Google Checkout (http://checkout.google.com/) for those who just want to put together a simple website with payments. I haven't looked into them much, but if I wanted to set up an online business (which I do) then these are the places I would start from.

« Last Edit: 23/08/2007, 23:16 by linux »

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« Reply #82 on 23/08/2007, 22:55 »
Quote from: linux on 23/08/2007, 22:51
Quote from: nlewis65 on 23/08/2007, 22:36
Thats all well and good for larger businesses but for smaller 1 man band businesses it is not feasable.

Options for small businesses are improving.

That I must agree but that doesn't answer the question as to why Plusnet put all our emails at risk with this upgrade. Perhaps someone from the team that was involved with this upgrade can comment on the safeguards that they put in place before hand.
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« Reply #83 on 23/08/2007, 23:00 »
Quote from: astarsolutions on 23/08/2007, 22:51
That still doesn't make any sense; storage is got to be significantly cheaper than spam prevention solutions.

It's not just a question of buying more disks, but of providing more servers, infrastructure and possibly staff to support them. With apparently no upper limit to the tide of spam, there is no upper limit to the required storage.
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« Reply #84 on 23/08/2007, 23:12 »
With the restructuring of the mail storage platform it is now very scalable, storage servers can easily be added increasing the available storage space.
Spam prevention involves real time processing as the e-mails pass through the system, there are also the problems associated with the classification of spam. Plusnet have been trying different systems for a while and it is clearly not an easy thing to get right.

The reason they deal with spam rather than store it (which would be a lot easier) is because their customers would would find it unacceptable to have in boxes full of spam.
Arthur
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« Reply #85 on 24/08/2007, 00:11 »
Hi there,

In response to the posts I've seen since I last took a look at this thread...

Quote from: xpher on 23/08/2007, 17:38
Got 1 test message. But have been sent other mail which I have not received. The mail I'm not receiving is to my domains.

That sounds like a different issue to me. Have you raised a ticket? If so, if you have the ID I can look into it when I'm next in the office.

Quote from: road-runner
An even bigger improvement would be to not receive the 90% in the first place!

You don't. We were deferring about 60% of the stuff before the Critical Path boxes were introduced.

Quote from: nlewis65
Your original update said that "no emails will be lost" so how come we have still not had them? Can one of the Plusnet staff please explain to me why this is.

This post may help answer that question.

Quote from: xpher on 23/08/2007, 20:42
Mail comimg through now. Just having probs with php form not sending me mail.

Again, not sure this is related. Raise a ticket and we can look into it.

Quote from: linux on 23/08/2007, 22:26
That's an increasingly pertinent question, as ISPs degrade the email service by adding ever more layers of spam filtering to avoid having to buy ever more disk storage.

We've spent plenty of money on disk storage! In case you missed it first time round take a look here.
Bob Pullen
Plusnet Support Team
Service Status :: RSS :: Email
twitter / plusnet
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« Reply #86 on 24/08/2007, 00:36 »
Quote from: astarsolutions on 23/08/2007, 23:12
The reason they deal with spam rather than store it (which would be a lot easier) is because their customers would would find it unacceptable to have in boxes full of spam.

If storing email is easier then why does it have to be automatically deleted from customers’ spam folders after 21 days?
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« Reply #87 on 24/08/2007, 04:40 »
Quote from: astarsolutions on 23/08/2007, 21:38
E-Mail isn't one of their "value added" services so it is something we pay for.
But like a previous poster mentioned if its important take it elsewhere; I know we shouldn't have to but past experience has taught us all, its necessary.

If this is the case I probably raise a ticket and ask for a reduction in my monthly fees as I do not require PN email service. I host my own mailserver and moved my DNS to here and I also use their MX backup both for $28 per year. As for mailservers these can be free and up to how much you want to pay.
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« Reply #88 on 24/08/2007, 06:52 »
There's been no response to my earlier email. Doesn't PlusNet keep a log of what goes through its mail-server? If it only recorded sender and delivery date then the information exists to inform users of who was trying to contact them.

Rather than directly black-holing what is supposed to be spam (but which is actually ham when errors of this kind are made), why isn't it hived off to a temporary file for a few hours so that errors - which will occur as long as Plusnet employs humans beings - can be recovered?
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« Reply #89 on 24/08/2007, 08:03 »

Please could we have a report here or on the Service Status web page of the fate of the 90% of messages that were blackholed but NOT deleted. When will they be delivered?
(Because until we know that they should have been delivered we won't know they have been definitively lost. The later update only mentions delivery of new messages, not dealing with the backlog.)

Or do you need to give an upward revision of the proportion of legitimate email that you discarded in transit?

[Reference is to Status message @ 10.27 on 23/08/07]
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« Reply #90 on 24/08/2007, 08:38 »
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blackholed but NOT deleted
Its the same thing, isn't it?

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Doesn't PlusNet keep a log of what goes through its mail-server? If it only recorded sender and delivery date then the information exists to inform users of who was trying to contact them.
I think under some European anti terrorist law the probably do; but imagine the effort in going throw isolating each users details, I'd rather they spent their time making sure future problems don't occur.

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If storing email is easier then why does it have to be automatically deleted from customers’ spam folders after 21 days?
Because they are spending their time dealing with spam rather than storing it, anything in the spam folder is probably spam so it is fairly safe to delete.

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If this is the case I probably raise a ticket and ask for a reduction in my monthly fees as I do not require PN email service
If only. The e-mail system like the web hosting system don't cost much in comparison to the Internet connection so any reduction would be negligible.
Arthur
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« Reply #91 on 24/08/2007, 09:02 »
Quote from: scubamad on 23/08/2007, 17:35
Quote from: Tigger on 23/08/2007, 15:50
Is 50% loss unlucky, or are my missing e-mails still queued on the servers?

Personally I have 100% loss of everything yesterday evening.

Either plus net is way out with thier estimates or they are being somewhat disingenuous
I also lost 100%.  Where did the 10% figure come from? Did any customer have any e-mails recovered?
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« Reply #92 on 24/08/2007, 09:04 »
Quote from: astarsolutions on 24/08/2007, 08:38
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If storing email is easier then why does it have to be automatically deleted from customers’ spam folders after 21 days?

Because they are spending their time dealing with spam rather than storing it, anything in the spam folder is probably spam so it is fairly safe to delete.

Safe to delete? My experience of PN spam checking suggests it has a pretty dismal failure rate for both false negatives AND false positives. It regularly marks, for example billing notifications from PN themselves as spam, not to mention important domain renewal notifications from a reputable registrar. If the spam filters were in any way accurate, 21 days would be fine, as it is, it is not worth using.
Mark
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« Reply #93 on 24/08/2007, 09:41 »
Quote from: Bob on 24/08/2007, 00:11
Quote from: road-runner
An even bigger improvement would be to not receive the 90% in the first place!
You don't. We were deferring about 60% of the stuff before the Critical Path boxes were introduced.

I think you misunderstood, I'll rephrase my comment:

An even bigger improvement would be if the PlusNet mail servers were to not receive the 90% in the first place!

Expanding on that a little:
It's all very well pouring vast resources into numerous gadgets which filter mail once it's arrived but perhaps ISP's should be getting together with a view to dealing with the real problem - the spam source.

Regards .....
Martin
A satisfied plusnet customer from October 2004 to Mid February 2009
PCLinuxOS - the radically simple distro-hopper-stopper
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« Reply #94 on 24/08/2007, 09:53 »
Quote from: astarsolutions on 24/08/2007, 08:38
Quote
blackholed but NOT deleted
Its the same thing, isn't it?

Not in my use of those words. In my book, 'blackholed' means that further automatic processing of that message is suspended, so it won't be delivered. But it remains in the system, so if it was blackholed erroneously then it can be retrieved and delivered. 'Deleted' means irrevocably removed from the system.

All I want to know is: are there any messages from before the resolution of the problem that might still be delivered to me, or should I now assume that 100% of my email during that period was discarded? [I think the latter, but it would be nice of my 'open and honest' service provider to say so.]


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« Reply #95 on 24/08/2007, 09:58 »
PN really MUST email their customers TODAY to tell them what's happened.  It's simply not good enough to rely on them going to the service status page (or The Register) to find out when it's THIS serious.

To not do so looks like a cover up.

I'll bet you that the vast majority of subscribers won't know anything has gone wrong until one of their friends rings them up and says "PN has lost mail again".  Some of that lost mail - as we all know - might have been extremely important.   What is currently happening smacks of "well if we don't tell everyone then hopefully most people won't notice or complain/leave" which is, after all, a classic cover up.
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