Frontpage Form does not send content to email

[rbccstmrtn]

Server: Linux

I created a form in Front Page configured to send the contents to an email address. FrontPage Extensions and FrontPage Mail were both installed. In the browser, the form submits and shows the confirmation page, but results are NOT sent to the email. Weird thing is that I have other FP webs on the same server configured similarly and they work and send the contents to the email.

Things I tried to resolve this (to no avail):

-Using other email addresses in the form properties
-Uninstall & reinstall FPSE from WHM & then from Cpanel
-Delete user account from WHM altogether, add back in (whereby FPSE are installed automatically per my setup.) Then, I attempted to "Install FrontPage Mail Extensions" but it did not identify the new account as being without them, as it did with other accounts. I republished and the form still behaves the same way: form submits, confirmation page appears, but results never appear in email.

It seems that something might be wrong server-side with the FP mail and I don't know enough about back end stuff to try to communicate to the server admin on where to look or what to look for.

What should I try next?

Rebecca

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SOLUTION SUSPECTED:

I found out that my client's mail server was rejecting the email message by doing a telnet session on that mail server.

Uncovering this problem was deceiving because:

1. My own email server was rejecting the mail on one of my email addresses because I have Spam Assassin set up. (The source email would need to be whitelisted.)
2. My email address at Yahoo!Mail didn't work because Yahoo!Mail server was rejecting the email also.
3. The client's mail server rejected the message, too.

All this said, there is no way (other than doing a telnet session) to find out why the email wasn't going anywhere. I had assumed, incorrectly, that one of 3 emails would be due diligence enough to determine the problem. (Yahoo rejecting the email was a real surprise to me!)

I finally got the form to work using another email address of mine -- one that wasn't requiring authentication by the sender. (I had SPAM Assassin enabled.)

To find the mail servers to test, follow these instructions:
http://www.exclamationsoft.com/exclamationsoft/netmailbot/help/reference/find_mail_server.asp
Then, in the same command prompt, type:
telnet servername port#
(Try ports 25 and 587 since these are the most common. Some ISPs block port 25 to reduce spam.)
e.g. telnet f.mx.mail.yahoo.com 25
This will tell you whether the server can be connected to -- or not. If not, then the server is rejecting any email sent to the domain from the form.


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ACTUAL SOLUTION:

Clients domain is pointed to their ISP so that email can be hosted by them.
Meanwhile, I'm hosting the web site.
All email (including personal emails) I attempt to send to my client's email address do not arrive.
This is because the server is looking LOCALLY for an email address to send to -- and there isn't one.
When I DELETED THE MX RECORD in my client's account via WHM, all emails were received successfully, including the Front Page form results.

*WHEW*

 

[rhenderson]

We have had so many problems with this in the past, we ave up. I guess you know Microsoft has discontinued FP. Anyway, some issues we found in the past were mod_security rules messing up FP mail and extensions. We just taught our customers how to use a php formmail script or the one that comes with cPanel. Good luck on your quest.

 

[rbccstmrtn]

Don't Use Front Page Server Extensions?

Some friendly advice:

If your company offers FP extensions, I recommend that you NOT tell your clients to use another technology if they want to use the FP form. My hosting provider told me this, and I found that very irritating since I chose their company BECAUSE they offered FPE.

I have use FP for 15 years and know the software thoroughly. Nowadays, if I find something doesn't work, it's always server side. Always.

Every single hosting provider I've used has at least one tech who doesn't want to perform due diligence on the problem -- usually on account that they don't care for MS products (on principle) or they find it "too hard" to solve (lazy).

Anytime I get a tech that says "use something else," I ask for another tech. If I can't get a tech who will come up with a solution, I switch providers.

Companies that offer FPE (Cpanel, hosting providers, etc) should also support it, whether it's supported elsewhere (by Microsoft) or not. Those that choose not to support what they advertise beg their own integrity -- and that isn't so good for business. The result is business lost.

 

[rhenderson]

Some friendly advice:

If your company offers FP extensions, I recommend that you NOT tell your clients to use another technology if they want to use the FP form. My hosting provider told me this, and I found that very irritating since I chose their company BECAUSE they offered FPE.

I have use FP for 15 years and know the software thoroughly. Nowadays, if I find something doesn't work, it's always server side. Always.

Every single hosting provider I've used has at least one tech who doesn't want to perform due diligence on the problem -- usually on account that they don't care for MS products (on principle) or they find it "too hard" to solve (lazy).

Anytime I get a tech that says "use something else," I ask for another tech. If I can't get a tech who will come up with a solution, I switch providers.

Companies that offer FPE (Cpanel, hosting providers, etc) should also support it, whether it's supported elsewhere (by Microsoft) or not. Those that choose not to support what they advertise beg their own integrity -- and that isn't so good for business. The result is business lost.

Then you would not want to call me FrontPage is EOL (End of Life) so why use it? It was specifically design to work with windows servers not linux. FP Ext are more of a patch than anything for linux.

Microsofts problem is that they were successful with FrontPage but not near as successful with windows servers in the last 10 years. They are however doing a better job now. Microsoft Expression has corrected the issues that frontpage caused, so why use an EOL software like Frontpage? (I guess you would want to still use it on your windows 95 machine)

There are server side problems with FP ext, most mod_sec rules break frontpage usage, so do we want security vs a FP ext to work properly?

Dear Customer,

Due to our lack of security because we want to fully support FP ext your account was hacked because we continued to support this outdate EOL software.

Two major points, FP Ext has secuirty problems and FrontPage publisher portion is complete junk, period!

Most old frontpage users learned the limitations of FrontPage on linux servers and used other methods to get around the issue. i.e. ftp programs, mizotec, php or cgi scripts etc...