Problems with hotmail

[CenturyBreak]

As an additional data point, I'm currently at 4 Timed Out errors, 1 SSL connection failed, and 1 NotAuthenticatedServerError.

Hey, at least there's some variety!

[Jeff]

Here are some various errors I captured last night:

1)
[21:46:47 10/08] [!Hotmail] {Recv} (65) 'ej OK Authentication encountered server error. Try again later.'
...
[21:46:55 10/08] [!Hotmail] {Send} (-1) 'el SELECT "INBOX"'
[21:46:57 10/08] [!Hotmail] {Recv} (86) 'el NO Select Command is not permitted in current state (NotAuthenticatedServerError)'


2)
[20:56:37 10/08] [!Hotmail] {Send} (-1) 'dj AUTHENTICATE PLAIN'
[20:57:12 10/08] [!Hotmail] {ERROR} 'Timeout (35s)'


3)
[19:56:07 10/08] [!Hotmail] {Connect/IMAP} ----- 'imap-mail.outlook.com:993'
[19:56:41 10/08] [!Hotmail] {ERROR} 'Failed to Process SSL Socket (Is SSL Plugin loaded?) [error:00000000:lib(0):func(0):reason(0)]'
[19:56:41 10/08] [!Hotmail] {Connect/IMAP} ----- 'Disconnect'


In case #1, you can see that Hotmail actually accepts ("OK") the login request, but the error information (which is for human eyes only; not to be parsed by the client) indicates a server error. It may seem odd that Hotmail accepts the login request when there's an error, but I suspect they do that on purpose so that the client doesn't think that the login provided is actually invalid, which could cause more confusion to the user than an error further down the line. Since PP thinks it has logged in, it tries to perform a command that Hotmail doesn't allow since the user is not actually logged in. This is the most obvious case that something is wrong on Hotmail's end.

Cases #2 and #3 are both time outs. In case #2, if you look at the time difference between the "Send" command and the error, you'll notice it's 35 seconds. That happens to be the timeout value I have for IMAP. Likewise, in case #3, the time difference between the attempt to connect and the error is 34 seconds (close enough to 35) -- PP doesn't recognize this as a timeout per se because PP tells the SSL plugin the timeout to use and SSL takes over from there, eventually resulting in a (presumed) timeout within the SSL plugin.


I believe that the default timeout for IMAP is 60 seconds. There was a bug in previous versions of POP Peeper that did affect Hotmail (primarily) and was because PP was telling SSL to use a very short timeout (for handshake negotiation); but now, it uses the same timeout value that PP uses for IMAP commands and shouldn't be a factor. You're welcome to try to increase the value (Tools / PPtweaker / Connection), but I'm ... somewhat... confident that the only thing you'll accomplish is to make PP wait longer before it errors.

btw, since sometime yesterday, I have noticed a much higher number of errors reported by my Hotmail account than even earlier this week, for which I had noticed that the number of errors was higher than normal before that... There was about a day in between (Wednesday) where the errors seemed back to normal.

[Jeff]

I just found some information that users of Thunderbird are reporting similar issues:
http://forums.mozillazine.org/viewtopic ... &t=2965259
It's probably not worth your time to read the entire thread, but one of the first posts mentioned a status page that has more information:
https://portal.office.com/servicestatus
office.com is owned by microsoft; at least they acknowledge the problem: "we're having issue, but we're working on it." Although the details under "show more" are a little less joyful.

[mjs]

.... You're welcome to try to increase the value (Tools / PPtweaker / Connection), but I'm ... somewhat... confident that the only thing you'll accomplish is to make PP wait longer before it errors....

Case in point, in the past I've tried increasing the timeout for IMAP from 60 (default) to 90 seconds and I find in general the result is basically only longer "mail checks". As far as I can tell there is very little to virtually no impact at all in reducing the number of errors, so I ended up returning the value to the default eventually. I've come to the conclusion that if there's an error after 60 seconds then waiting another 30 seconds to find this out doesn't serve much purpose.

So the results I get agrees with Jeff's conclusion.

Of course feel free to try it out for yourself and if so you can report back your own results if you like.

Btw, the 2nd link that Jeff posted really does tell the story. We can only hope that Outlook.com eventually resolves the "issues" that they've acknowledged they're having.

[rvail317]

Another data point:
On my dual-boot system (Win8.1/Win10) PP works without any errors on Win10 only.
My guess: some recent Windows Update (for Win8.1) was insufficiently tested for problems, and is somehow interfering with PP's ability to
correctly log in to Microsoft's own email servers at Hotmail.com and Outlook.com.
They've been issuing multiple Windows Updates lately for "getting your system ready" to upgrade to Win10.

[spc3rd]

Thanks again to everyone for your respective feedback!

A friendly reminder to please keep posts on-topic. Links to sources containing material unrelated to the topic being discussed here may be removed.

** NOTE: You may also want to check out the latest updated info provided by Microsoft at the 2nd link in Jeff's post above. MS states they have issued a temporary fix while they continue addressing the Hotmail/Outlook access issues.

Thank you and best regards,

[mjs]

MS is now reporting: "Everything is up and running." (refer to the link that Jeff posted previously)

For me personally, PP has been error free since 10/9/15 as of around 4:10 PM PST.

[Jeff]

I didn't pay much attention to the number of errors over the weekend, but I haven't gotten a single error yet today (knock on wood).

rvail317 -- are you using the same configuration on both computers? ie. edit the account and refer to the "server type" -- only IMAP was affected by the issues; not POP3 or Hotmail/Outlook.

[CenturyBreak]

Well, the NotAuthenticatedServerError error is back!

The good news: I've only seen it once so far today, but there had been zero instances since last weekend, so it appeared it was gone for good... apparently it's only mostly gone...

[Jeff]

Yeah, I noticed one -- maybe two -- errors over the weekend, too. Makes me wonder if they didn't fix it so much as patch it, and they just need to reboot or something to fix it. Still, it's better than it was and I still recommend IMAP over the alternatives (POP3 or WebMail) as far as POP Peeper is concerned.

[CenturyBreak]

Three more instances of NotAuthenticatedServerError this morning, all on different accounts. Of course, that's only three that I noticed... some may have popped up and cleared on the next check without me noticing...

Sounds like the patch is leaking!

[Protocol]

As an additional data point, I'm currently at 4 Timed Out errors, 1 SSL connection failed, and 1 NotAuthenticatedServerError.

I am also getting an "SSL Connection Failed" error on my Hotmail account.

Edit: It seems like I posted too soon. It has come good by itself.