If the SmarterMail service is not running on my server, will SMTP and POP still respond to a SMTP request from a monitor?

Question asked by jasonj - 8/16/2019 at 10:14 AM

Answered

This morning we had an issue that the SmarterMail service was set to run manually instead of automatically after doing and update and restarting the server. The problem is that our monitors that do a check on the SMTP and POP ports didn't fire off saying that they were down. So if the SmarterMail service isn't running do SMPT and POP requests still respond? Or how can I monitor this to make sure I get alerted if the SmarterMail service hasn't started?

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echoDreamz Replied

8/16/2019 at 3:08 PM

If the MailService.exe process is not running, then NOTHING works. Even webmail will fail to load as it relies on the main SM process for everything.

We monitor through PRTG, all services (SMTP, POP, IMAP, XMPP), webmail, we monitor the SM service itself to make sure it is "running", as well as the SM process itself, the proc directory, the drop the directory, as well as custom sensors to monitor the spool size, threads, connections etc.

Matthew Titley Replied

8/16/2019 at 6:29 PM

Just seconding Christopher: no Smartermail svc, nuttin' honey.

Sébastien Riccio Replied

8/17/2019 at 2:29 AM

The only service that would be still running when mailservice.exe is down, is the web server.

(Running but answering that the mail server is unreachable).

As suggested, it's better to monitor every protocol port that should answer as the executable could be still running but one of the sub-service could be out of order.

Sébastien Riccio System & Network Admin https://swisscenter.com

jasonj Replied

8/19/2019 at 7:01 AM

Thanks for the replies! Chistopher, If your smartermail.exe service is not running, do your SMTP and POP monitors say that SMTP and POP are down?

echoDreamz Replied

8/19/2019 at 1:11 PM

Of course, along with a blast of tons of other sensors. However, we also have it setup where PRTG "pauses" the other sensors that "rely" on the main SM process, so we dont get barraged with 20 different alerts.

jasonj Replied

8/19/2019 at 1:45 PM

Sounds good, I only ask because the solution we are using (Monitis) to monitor didn't say that SMTP or POP were down even though our SmarterMail.exe service wasn't running. Hopefully, they can figure out what happened on their side. Thanks for the help!

echoDreamz Replied

8/19/2019 at 3:57 PM

We've tried numerous monitoring systems, we always come back to PRTG.

echoDreamz Replied

8/19/2019 at 4:01 PM

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As well, our SMTP, IMAP, POP sensors login to the server and send mail / check for mail rather than just checking if SM responds to port connections. We've found this allows us to better monitor SM since previously we've had PRTG say everything is A-OK when just monitoring to make sure SM responds on x port, but something was actually wrong with SMTP. So sending an email completely to make sure the entire SMTP session completes, same for IMAP and POP3.

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