corrupt emails in queue

[patchwork]

Hi all

Just recently I've been seeing a few corrupt emails in the exim mail queue.

When I use ConfigServer - cmq, it says "Broken spool file - removed" but the corrupt emails are never actually removed. I've also been seeing errors in some of my cron jobs saying things like "2014-01-30 00:00:02 1W8f34-000004-Rq Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/4/1W8f34-000004-Rq-D: File exists"

I was wondering what the best way is to delete the corrupt emails in the exim mail queue.

I must admit in 10 years of having and running cpanel based servers this is the first time I've come across corrupt emails in the queue, what could be causing the corrupt emails? (I'm guessing they were just created when something crashed, and once the corrupt files are removed the problem will go away)

The server is running 4 SSD (64GB Intel X25-E Extreme) drives in raid 10
CENTOS 6.5 x86_64 standard
WHM 11.40.1 (build 9)
The system load is generally under 0.5
Memory use is around 40% (12GB total)


Many Thanks
Pete

 

[cPanelMichael]

Hello

You can manually remove the files with the "rm" command. Look in /var/log/exim_paniclog to see if you notice any specific error messages related to the failures.

Thank you.

 

[patchwork]

I've been looking through some very old threads here and it suggested exim could be easily broken if the deletions were not done correctly and in the correct order.

 

[patchwork]

Hello

Look in /var/log/exim_paniclog to see if you notice any specific error messages related to the failures.

Thank you.

The only thing in the current and archived panic logs are more lines like these

2014-01-23 15:00:01 1W6LlB-000004-Pb Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/B/1W6LlB-000004-Pb-D: File exists
2014-01-23 18:00:03 1W6OZP-000004-0W Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/P/1W6OZP-000004-0W-D: File exists
2014-01-23 20:30:05 1W6Qub-000004-Rb Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/b/1W6Qub-000004-Rb-D: File exists
2014-01-24 15:14:01 1W6iSH-000004-LI Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/H/1W6iSH-000004-LI-D: File exists
2014-01-25 00:00:02 1W6qfK-000004-Lr Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/K/1W6qfK-000004-Lr-D: File exists
2014-01-25 16:00:03 1W75eN-000004-2r Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/N/1W75eN-000004-2r-D: File exists
2014-01-26 19:50:03 1W7ViV-000004-4y Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/V/1W7ViV-000004-4y-D: File exists
2014-01-27 07:34:11 1W7ghv-000004-C5 Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/v/1W7ghv-000004-C5-D: File exists
2014-01-27 07:34:11 1W7ghv-000004-C9 Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/v/1W7ghv-000004-C9-D: File exists
2014-01-27 08:15:03 1W7hLT-000004-C3 Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/T/1W7hLT-000004-C3-D: File exists
2014-01-27 17:00:01 1W7pXV-000004-VE Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/V/1W7pXV-000004-VE-D: File exists
2014-01-27 17:30:02 1W7q0Y-000004-CS Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/Y/1W7q0Y-000004-CS-D: File exists
2014-01-27 19:40:02 1W7s2M-000004-7q Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/M/1W7s2M-000004-7q-D: File exists
2014-01-28 05:30:03 1W81FL-000004-10 Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/L/1W81FL-000004-10-D: File exists
2014-01-28 19:00:02 1W8DtC-000004-R1 Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/C/1W8DtC-000004-R1-D: File exists
2014-01-28 23:00:01 1W8HdR-000004-L1 Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/R/1W8HdR-000004-L1-D: File exists
2014-01-29 03:10:03 1W8LXP-000004-Dk Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/P/1W8LXP-000004-Dk-D: File exists
2014-01-29 03:30:08 1W8Lqq-000004-B5 Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/q/1W8Lqq-000004-B5-D: File exists
2014-01-29 03:35:02 1W8Lva-000004-1a Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/a/1W8Lva-000004-1a-D: File exists
2014-01-29 03:50:04 1W8MA8-000004-Ub Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/8/1W8MA8-000004-Ub-D: File exists
2014-01-29 07:35:03 1W8Pfr-000004-FC Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/r/1W8Pfr-000004-FC-D: File exists
2014-01-29 07:45:03 1W8PpX-000004-UE Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/X/1W8PpX-000004-UE-D: File exists
2014-01-29 10:00:03 1W8RwB-000004-8Y Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/B/1W8RwB-000004-8Y-D: File exists
2014-01-29 10:50:09 1W8Sif-000004-84 Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/f/1W8Sif-000004-84-D: File exists
2014-01-29 12:40:02 1W8UR0-000004-Lk Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/0/1W8UR0-000004-Lk-D: File exists
2014-01-29 13:30:02 1W8VDO-000004-3B Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/O/1W8VDO-000004-3B-D: File exists
2014-01-29 16:55:01 1W8YPl-000004-Pf Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/l/1W8YPl-000004-Pf-D: File exists
2014-01-29 17:00:03 1W8YUd-000004-CZ Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/d/1W8YUd-000004-CZ-D: File exists
2014-01-29 18:25:09 1W8Zoz-000004-7e Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/z/1W8Zoz-000004-7e-D: File exists
2014-01-29 21:02:02 1W8cGo-000004-KU Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/o/1W8cGo-000004-KU-D: File exists
2014-01-30 00:00:02 1W8f34-000004-Rq Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/4/1W8f34-000004-Rq-D: File exists
2014-01-30 01:30:01 1W8gS9-000004-HY Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/9/1W8gS9-000004-HY-D: File exists
2014-01-30 08:10:03 1W8mhH-000004-B2 Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/H/1W8mhH-000004-B2-D: File exists
2014-01-30 19:16:01 1W8x5l-000004-P6 Failed to create spool file /var/spool/exim_incoming/input/l/1W8x5l-000004-P6-D: File exists

It looks like the ID's are all different so deleting the few left in the queue will probably not fix the underlying problem.

Pete

 

[cPanelMichael]

You may not be able to remove the message through traditional methods if the file is corrupt. Are you receiving a specific error message when attempting to remove the message directly via the "exim -Mrm <MSGID>" command?

Thank you.

 

[cPanelMichael]

Also, feel free to open a support ticket using the link in my signature so we can take a closer look. You can post the ticket number here so we can update this thread with the outcome.

Thank you.

 

[patchwork]

My Request id is: 4511681

 

[cPanelMichael]

To update, it looks like the actual error message itself may have been related to the installation of MailScanner on this system. The customer was advised to temporarily disable MailScanner to see if the issue continues.

Thank you.