A Guide To Fixing Maillita 1.2b7



Last Updated on 04 April 2001.

Be sure and check out the spam section! It's been updated.

This is a step-by-step guide designed to help you figure out what's gone wrong. Maillita is a really great program, inasmuch as I think it's a lot of fun, but it was never really finished, and its documentation never really matured. Here's what I can offer. I hope it helps!

To use the guide:

  1. Leave your browser open next to Maillita and follow along in the web broswer window as you go.
  2. You could also print out or save the guide to keep it handy, either in your browser or in your favorite text editor, (notepad or a replacement). A great text editor, Edit Pad, is available at http://www.jgsoft.com/.
  3. ANSWER ALL THE QUESTIONS I TELL YOU TO! Yes, I really do need to know all that stuff. You can follow logical order, jumping from one section to another when I say, but don't skip around at will--follow instructions. It will help me answer your question on the first email, not the 10th.
  4. Be patient. I have a life too, you know!

THE STEPS:

As you follow these steps, I want you to bear in mind that Maillita is a part of a process. Maillita must start properly for the process to start. First, your email program sends the mail to Maillita. Second, Maillita does stuff to it. Third, Maillita sends it to your ISP's mail server, which takes care of getting it to its destination. Things can go wrong at each of the steps, and so we will look at each of the steps to see if your email made it that far. If it did, we will move on and look at the next step in the process.

Did you make sure you turned it on? Right click on its tray icon and make sure "Listen" is checked. Delete any strigns of nonsenes characters that appear in the fill-in boxes, and any filters you don't like, don't understand, or don't want. Then go on and ask yourself--

  1. Do you get a message like, "Port NNNNN already bound" or "Winsock Error" when you first start the program? If yes, goto "Startup Issues:"
  2. Does your email program display error messages, does the scroll bar not move all the way from left to right, does the scroll bar or other progres indicator stall for a long period of time, does your email program display messages like "could not connect to server," or "server error?" You can't send mail to yourself, either. If these apply, goto "First Relay Issues:"
  3. Are you able to send a piece of email to yourself using Maillita, but the filter's don't do anything, or look like they don't? If yes, goto "Filter Issues:"
  4. Does your email program, such as Eudora, The Bat!, etc. appear to work normally, the scroll bar moves from right to left, there are no error messages or timeouts, even thought you CAN'T send email to yourself? Or, does your mail client produce "cannot connect to server" errors, stall, or times out even though you've been through the First Relay section and you're sure that's not the problem? If yes to either question, goto "Second Relay Issues:"


Startup Issues:

You have another SMTP server running. It's as simple as that--or else Windows thinks you have another SMTP server running, and that can be a pain. Somewhere on your computer, another program has "bound" the SMTP port you are trying to use. You can:
  1. Turn off your other mailserver. You can't run two at once on the same port.
  2. If you don't know what your mailserver is, disable all running programs, try again, and see if things work.
  3. Look for "hidden" running programs. If you have a current backup of the Windows registry, look at
    HKLM/Software/Microsoft/Current Version/Run and RunServices
    Try deleting any key that looks like it might refer to a mailserver, especially one you didn't know you had. Be prepared to reboot to safe mode and restore your registry from backup if things go really wrong--which they can. Wrong editing of these two keys can disable network functions, virus checkers, automatic security software, deleted-file protection, event logging, and anything else you expect your computer to do. You have been warned.
  4. Change the port number in the Server/Local Port to some oddball value like 5789. Then change the port number for SMTP in your outgoing email options in your email software to the SAME NUMBER!
  5. Try re-installing Dial-Up Networking from your CD-Rom, and then reinstall any upgrades that relate. Sometimes windows just gets broken, and thinks something is going on that's not.

If you've done all this, and you still get winsock/port bound errors, email me!



First Relay Issues:

The first relay is the one between your mail program--the program you use to write your email, like Eudora, Pegasus Mail, or whatnot--and Maillita. The mail program, which I will call the client for the rest of this text, has to hand off the piece of mail to Maillita. In order to do this they must agree on a number called the port. The port number does several jobs. From one point of view, it's really a "service type," a number that lets a program know what type of connection to make, and what type of data to send. It doesn't exist as some plug or port on a board, it's just an ID, as if you said to the mail server, "Hey, I have some POP 3 email to upload to you." POP 3 is the phrase we use to describe what a computer would call port 110 data. In network terms, you (the client) are connecting to the server "on" port 110.

We can think about this two different ways. If I send a package of data and label it as port 110 data, the server will expect it to be POP 3 email. If it's my Auntie Donna's recipie collection, the server will return an error message-- and not cook me dinner, either. The opposite is true. If I tell the server to expect recipes in packages that are labeled 110, and you try to send POP 3 email data packaged with that label, the server will reject it. The data must be labeled with the port number the server expects for that kind of content-- the data must have the right label, and the label must mean what it's expected to mean. So, we must tell the client what port to label the email with, that is "what port to send email on," and we must tell the server that the exact same port number will mean "here comes email," that is, "what port to accept incoming email on."

By the way, there's another point of view that gives us another way to think about the port number, and one that's more accurate in terms of network standards. A port number is a lot like a telephone extension number--first you call the office at 972-239-2922, then you ask for extension 3 to get the right person. So your connection on the telephone goes from your host, that is, your phone number, and your port, that is, your extension number, to the host and port (number and extension) on the remote side. The port numbers form a mandatory part of the connection (you can't talk to me without dialing my extension) and they keep all the different users (and pieces of software) separate and organized. Someone at extension 15 at your office can be talking to extension 2 at my office, and our conversation (from your extension 1 to my extension 3) won't be affected at all. Thanks to port numbers, you can surf the web and check email at the same time, and all the data goes to the right place.

So, errors in the first relay will be caused by using wrong or mismatched port numbers, or telling the client to send mail to the wrong host. Follow these steps to examine the probem:

  1. Start Maillita. Either right click on its tray icon in the bottom right corner of the screen by the clock, or click on its taskbar icon. (In the future I will say right-click, but you can do either.)
  2. Choose the Server tab. Look at the number that says "local port." Pick a number, lets say 1478, and put it in here. Low numbers may conflict with other, more routine things, so avoid them unless you use 25.
  3. Move over to the Information tab. Click once on all three of the Reset buttons.
  4. Start your email client. Find a box labeled "SMTP" or "SMTP Port." It may be under "Options," "Network Options," "Mail Transport," or some other menu. Consult your application's help file for the location of this option, or for:
    Change this number to the number you picked before, whether 1478 or 25.
  5. The mail program needs to know more about Maillita than the port number in order to pass it mail, though. It must know where to make the hand-off. Near the SMTP port option, or on another properties page nearby, you will see an opton for the SMTP server name. Write down what it says in this blank, probably something like mail.something.com, or maybe smtp.something.com. After you write it down, type over it with the word "localhost" (without quotes). (If you want to be really professional, say "127.0.0.1" without quotes. This is a numerical code that means, "the machine I'm sitting at.") The word localhost is an internet name that always points to the computer the running program is running on. When you type it in, you are telling your mail program to look for Maillita on the same machine the mail program is running on. If this is for some reason not the case, you will need to obtain and enter the name or IP address of the computer running Maillita into this part of your mail program. The mail program must know where to find Maillita in order to connect to it.
  6. So, at this point, you should be able to ALT-TAB back and forth between Maillita and your mail client and verify that the SAME NUMBER is in both the Local Port box in Maillita and the SMTP port setting in your mail client. Check back and forth until you are sure the port nubmers are exactly, exactly the same.
  7. Close and then restart your mail client. Attempt to send yourself an email-message. It probably won't work. If it does, GOOD! You are almost through with this document. Even if you don't get the email you sent, you should be able to look at the Information window in Maillita now. Do this.
  8. Look in the Information window and you should see a line of text like
    Connected: 110.25.97.8 at 14:08:59 on 1/1/99
    This tells you that your email client connected to Maillita and performed the first relay correctly. If you don't see this, you need to recheck your port settings.
  9. If you can see these connection messages in the Information window but can't send yourself an email message for any reason, go to the second relay section.
  10. If you can't see any connection messages, and you are sure your port settings are correct, try substituting the actual IP address of your computer for "localhost," obtained by issuing the command WINIPCFG at the Run prompt of the Start menu in Win95. You can also try checking and unchecking the IP-Restriction box.
  11. If you have gotten Maillita working, either check the IP-Restriction box to prevent spammers from using you as a mail relay, or pick a truly oddball port number to use an hope they don't guess it. Better yet, do both.
If you haven't gotten Maillita working far enough to print "connected" messages in the Information window, email me with:

And by the way, 25 and 1478 aren't the only valid numbers. Try whatever strikes your fancy, but try to keep it above 1000 or so. Also, some versions of Maillita won't use a Local Port number greater than 2000--it's one of the few obvious problems I've run into. If a port greater than 2000 won't work, try another one.

Filter Issues:

This is the shortest section, becuase I've never had any trouble with it. Not exactly true, but close. First off: you remove filters by clicking on the FAR LEFT of the filter to highlight it and then pressing Remove Item on the bottom. Be sure to Save Items when you have them the way you want them.

  1. Begin by removing any filters that appear to be made of nonsense caracters or written in Martian.
  2. In fact, remove all the filters and let's start over.
  3. Once you've got a clean slate, click the mouse on the round button next to "Message-Id" on the left side under Standards. Then click on Add Item on the bottom.
  4. Save Items, then make sure the server is listening and send yourself an email. If you can't send yourself an email, do all the other sections in this document first until the problem is resolved: this section is in the middle because filtering is in the middle of the process, not because you should work on filters before you can even send mail.
  5. Look at the email headers (blah blah blah, Show Kludges, Show RFC 822 Headers, Show All Headers: consult your application's help if none of these commands work for you); you should have a message ID much shorter than the ones that your ISP usually assigns you. It will be in the format shown in the Maillita filters window, which unfortunately you can't change. Take note of the X-Mailer header!
  6. Go back to Maillita. This time, click on the X-Mailer button under Standards, then type a fake x-header in the Replace By box. For example, X-Purple: Favorite Color . Then of course Add Item, and Save Items. Send yourself another email.
  7. Look at all the headers. You'll see that the xmailer header has been replaced. The Message ID has gotten a little strange--I've found that all versions of Maillita that I've tested do this. I have no idea why. It's a small price to pay, and the Message ID is still pretty useful.
  8. If the Message-ID or the X-Mailer were not replaced, try changing the text in the Search For box. Click on the leftmost word in the filter (up top), change thet text, and click Update Item. A good way to get the text to search for is to use Control-C and Control-V to paste it in from one of your emails you sent to yourself.
If it still doesn't work, email me, but bear in mind all my filters work. Yup, that's right: I don't really know how to fix broken filters, other than to suggest you try adding/removing them, and changing various parts and hitting Update. Don't forget that you can choose Header or Body in the bottom left! Be sure to tell me: Good Luck! Don't forget Save Items!

Second Relay Issues:

If you've made it this far, you are obviously not too bad at troubleshooting relay issues. If you jumped directly to this section, then you should be sure and skim over the First Relay Issues section above. It's a little bit harder to troubleshoot second relay, because the Information window in Maillita won't tell us if we're connected properly or not. Also, you'll need to do a little bit of homework: Find out the name and port number of your ISP's SMTP server. You may have written down this name while fixing First Relay Issues; if you did, retype it in the "SMTP-gate" field in Maillita. The port is 25 in more than 9999 out of 10000 cases, so if they didn't specify a port, use 25. The server name is most often one of four things:

Of course, your ISP probably told you this, or it might have been in the "sever name" box of your email program. If you can't find it, give your ISP a call-- they should be able to tell you almost instantly. Sometimes they're hard to guess because someone wanted to give them a catchy name, for example, my college used to have cyrus.utdallas.edu. Who'd ever guess "cyrus" was the name of a mail server?

Also, remember that Maillita works ONLY with SMTP mail servers. While there are such things as POP3 and IMAP sends, Maillita won't filter mail sent that way.

Once you have this information:

  1. Bring up the Server tab in Maillita, by right clicking on the icon.
  2. In the SMTP-Gate field, fill in the server name. This is NOT localhost. It's the name the ISP gave you.
  3. In the Port field on the SAME LINE, NOT, NOT, the local port field, fill in 25 or whatever number your ISP told you.
  4. Set Maillita to Listen and send yourself a piece of email. If you don't get it, check the values you filled into SMTP-Gate and make sure that they match what your ISP told you.
  5. You can also check the settings your ISP told you manually. Bringup the Run box from the Win95 start menu. Type telnet [space] the name of the machine they gave you [space] the port number [press enter]
    For example:
    telnet mail.dingbats.org 25 [enter]
     A crude little telnet window will pop up. Don't worry about what it's really for. Just look at the first line for a message like:
    220 mail.dingbats.org ESMTP server (SLMail 2.07) Ready Monday, 1 January 1999 13:54:09 -0600
     What this means is not important. If the server doesn't answer back, try hitting return a couple of times. If the server won't answer back on its correct port within a few seconds (though you may have to allow up to 30 in some cases), you've got the wrong settings or the server is down. When you're done typing in nonsense words just to see the server answer back "Syntax Error," enter QUIT [enter] to let the server know you're done annoying him and won't leave a tip.


If you can't send yourself an email after doing this, and you know First Relay is working because you see the proper messages in the Information window, email me and tell me: Bear in mind that I can do a couple of crude tests from my place, like the manual SMTP server check I describe above, but this issue is one you'll mainly have to work out with your ISP. If you can't use your ISP's outgoing mail server without Maillita, you won't be able to use it with Maillita. Duh.

Some Points To Ponder

First off, I do have a life, or at least I try. I'm good with computers, but don't expect me to troubleshoot your setup with a proxy server, 3 SMTP servers, 2 tagline attachers, and a petunia. Just give me the petunia to put in my planter and keep your too-complicated issues to yourself. You could also try usenet groups like
comp.mail
comp.mail.misc
comp.mail.headers (since Maillita is for altering headers) or the very long-named
comp.os.ms- windows.apps.winsock.mail
and see if anyone there will help you. Maillita is a very obscure program usually used by very sophisticated people, and so don't expect 400 people to rush to your help. Try modifying settings, turning things off and on even if they don't make sense. That's how I got it to work

A good TCP/IP networking introduction is Daryl's TCP/IP Primer. It's a good place to learn, especially if troubleshooting Maillita makes you want to learn more about the internet. It doesn't teach much about Civil War history, though, and that's always a major flaw. :)

Also, be on the lookout for SPAM! Junk mailers are always looking for a way to send mail using someone else's computer. If you set it up wrong, Maillita can let them do this. Spammers usually check every internet address for a connection on port 25, and then try to send themself a test message. If the test message works, they will relay--I kid you not--900 messages a minute or more through your home computer until someone catches them.

Most ISPs will terminate you if they find out you've been running the server that just got their whole domain blacklisted. They may sue you, too. They may tar and feather you, and I wouldn't blame them. They may....you get it. Keep the IP restriction checked, use a funny port number other than 25 for your first relay port, and keep an eye on your logfile (you did set a log file on the Information page, right?) and your total mail count. If you see that Maillita has relayed 5,211 emails since lunch, turn it off, and don't restart it until you've figured out how to make yourself less vulnerable.

Finally, don't hesitate to ask for help, but remember that I'm not responsible for what happens to your computer. You are.


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This Document Copyright 1999 — 2006 Tony A.T. Mendina. All rights reserved except if noted above.