"New Mail Check" is broken

[Ralph Cohen]

On Sun, 29 Aug 1999 11:36:27 -0700 (PDT), Bill Wood wrote:

>Well, it might be an network problem. I haven't a clue
>why the problem occurs in my case, but it does,
>virtually without fail, and has for as long as I can
>remember. It may well be that my ISP's mail server
>hangs up in the middle of a log on, every now and then.
>But one of the key characteristics of any design is how
>well it handles errors, failures, and out-of-spec
>conditions. When a log-on stalls out and just hangs
>there I would suggest that it should be detected by the
>app and some action taken. A simple and time-proven one
>is to try again. Or something. Anyway, this problem may
>not be universal, but neither, apparently, is it
>uncommon, and I hope some fix/patch can be provided by
>the designers.
>

I agree completely.  This problem does seem to be network related since
I never have the problem with one ISP (dial-up) but always with another
(cable).  I also had a similar problem with PostRoad Mailer with the
same cable ISP, which is one of the reasons I moved to PMMail since PRM
was no longer being supported.  It also occurs regardless of the mail
server being queried (I regularly access three different systems), so
it doesn't seem to be tied into a particular mail server.  For me the
problem occurs primarily on weekdays and not on weekends, but otherwise
no pattern is apparent.  I have tried mail retrieval intervals ranging
from 2 minutes to 10 minutes, but that doesn't have any effect. 
Sometimes I can go for days without any stalls and other times it
happens repeatedly for an hour or so.  My cable connection does not
seem otherwise impaired during these periods, and I can ping the mail
server without any problem.  As you mentioned, several people -
including me - have reported this problem to Southsoft since last Fall
but no fix has been offered.  I also suggested several brute-force
approaches to fixing the problem but none seemed to appeal to the
authors.  Hopefully, the report you just sent to them (the one posted
here was just a copy, right?) will alert them that the problem still
exists.

Hopefully, someone's still listening.

Ralph Cohen

rpcohen@neurotron.com