Message Does Not Arrive Across the Internet

Problem: A message is not successfully delivered between a GroupWise user and an e-mail user somewhere on the Internet.
Action: Review the stages of message flow performed by the Internet to send and receive messages across the Internet. See Message Delivery to and from the Internet in Message Flow Diagrams in GroupWise 7 Troubleshooting 3: Message Flow and Directory Structure.
Action: The most useful procedure to find the source of a problem when a message is not being sent across the Internet is to break the GroupWise send process into steps and verify that the message arrives at each destination before the next piece receives and delivers it.

If a message has Pending status in the sender’s Sent Items folder, the message is somewhere in the GroupWise system.

A message has Pending status in the sender’s Sent Items folder until it is converted and queued to the SMTP service. The message has Transferred status after the Internet Agent queues the message to the SMTP service. If the Internet Agent is unsuccessful in sending the message and gets a temporary error (for example, Host Down), it attempts to send the message according to the Retry Schedule. During this time, the message has Pending status in the sender’s Sent Items folder. If the Internet Agent is ultimately unsuccessful in sending the message, the sender receives an undeliverable status.

The following steps provide general guidelines for checking the message at each point in the GroupWise system:

  1. Stop the Internet Agent and the Message Transfer Agent. Send a message from GroupWise, then look in the post_office_a\wpcsin\0-7 directory for a file where the client transfers the message. If the file exists, verify the time and date stamp of the file and continue with Step 2. If the file does not exist, the client did not transfer the file into the \wpcsin\0-7 directory. Verify the address of the message and send another message to someone else on the Internet.

  2. If the file does exist in the post_office_a\wpcsin\0-7 directory, then start the Message Transfer Agent. The Message Transfer Agent polls the \wpcsin\0-7 directory and places the message in the wpgate\gwia\wpcsout\gwixxxx\0-7 directory. (gwixxxx is a random directory name generated from information from ConsoleOne.) If the file exists, continue to Step 3.

    If the file does not exist in the wpcsout\gwixxxx\0-7 directory, then the Message Transfer Agent is not processing the files. See Message Transfer Agent Problems. After the MTA is working correctly, return to Step 1.

  3. After the file is in the \gwixxxx\0-7 directory, start the Internet Agent. The file should transfer to the wpgate\gwia\send directory. If the file exists in the send directory, continue to Step 4.

    If the file does not exist in the \send directory, then the error is written to the log file. Look at the log file in the wpgate\gwia\000.prc directory. Files sent from GroupWise that have been corrupted are transferred to the wpcsout\problem directory. Change the log level to Diag, then repeat Step 1 through Step 3.

  4. After the file is delivered to the send directory, exit the Internet Agent.

    While the Internet Agent is delivering a message, it builds a file in the domain\wpgate\gwia\result directory. As soon as it delivers the entire message, check the result directory.

    If the file does not exist in the result directory, then the Internet Agent is not working. Check the /dhome and /home switches to ensure that they are pointing to the correct directories.

    If the file does exist in the result directory, check the TCP configuration or read the file and notice the last part of the message that was sent. You should have a file that contains several lines of comments preceded by 250 (OK reply).

  5. If an Internet host is down or the connection is not made on the Internet, start the Internet Agent to place the message in the wpgate\gwia\defer directory for 20 minutes. The Internet Agent transfers the file to the send directory for another attempt at sending to the Internet. The Internet Agent defers and re-queues the message according to the Retry Schedule. The Internet Agent makes this attempt three times in one hour and then every four hours for four days. After the four days, if the Internet host remains down, an undeliverable status is sent back to the sender.

  6. If the file in the result directory does not indicate an error, start the Internet Agent again and see if SMTP sends a message back to the sender’s post office. In the Client Sent Items folder, check the message properties for the message status. At this point, an undeliverable status indicates an incorrect Internet address.

  7. Messages sent from GroupWise with a Delayed Delivery status do not go to the send directory. Instead they reside in the wpgate\gwia\gwhold directory until the date the message should be sent.

  8. If an Internet user receives an undeliverable message because of an incorrect address to a Groupwise user, a copy of the message from the Internet resides in the wpgate\gwia\gwprob directory.