Why is WinXP Pro's IIS SMTP crippled?

[Ecrsm]

Thought I could use WinXP Pro's SMTP for something useful, but quickly
discovered that it is intentionally cripped to send only.

Its obvious that this is a deliberate to get you to hand more money over to
Bill.

Found another Windows SMTP solution (MailEnable - its free even), but why
did M$ even bother to have an SMTP available on WinXP Pro that is only
capable of sending? I can't see any use for only being able to send email.
That is incredibly lame and gay.

 

[Vanguard]

Thought I could use WinXP Pro's SMTP for something useful, but quickly
discovered that it is intentionally cripped to send only.

Its obvious that this is a deliberate to get you to hand more money
over to Bill.

Found another Windows SMTP solution (MailEnable - its free even), but
why did M$ even bother to have an SMTP available on WinXP Pro that is
only capable of sending? I can't see any use for only being able to
send email. That is incredibly lame and gay.

You haven't a clue what is SMTP, do you? SMTP = Simple Mail Transfer
Protocol. It is an OUTBOUND protocol. You use it to SEND e-mail, not
to receive it. If you want to *receive* e-mail then you need a POP3
server.

Read up at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smtp, then read RFC 2821
(http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2821). Do you see any commands for
receiving e-mails? The e-mail client connects to the SMTP server which
than accepts the messages and *sends* them out.

You'll find lots of anti-spam filters will reject your e-mails because
you will be sending from a host with a dynamically assigned IP address.
Real e-mail servers have static IP addresses. Infects user hosts
running mailer trojans are running with dynamic IP addresses.

What you want for receiving e-mail is a POP3 server. Read up at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pop3 and
http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1939. I think Pegasus has their Mercury
mail server that is free that wraps together several e-mail protocols,
SMTP (send) and POP3 (receive) included. The *user* or workstation
versions of NT, like WinXP Pro, provide SMTP but they are obviously
designed for end users, not as server hosts. Windows 2003 Server might
include both types of mail servers. Don't expect user versions of
operating systems to have the same features as server versions of them.

 

[Steve Schofield]

Check out www.smartertools.com (Smartermail 4.0) free for one domain.
It has IMAP, POP3, SMTP and works *very* well. It is written in .NET.

--

Steve Schofield
Windows Server MVP - IIS
ASPInsider Member - MCP

http://www.orcsweb.com/
Managed Complex Hosting
#1 in Service and Support

 

[Ecrsm]

You haven't a clue what is SMTP, do you? SMTP = Simple Mail Transfer
Protocol. It is an OUTBOUND protocol. You use it to SEND e-mail, not to
receive it. If you want to *receive* e-mail then you need a POP3 server.

Pop3 is simply a retrieval protocol to pull already delivered email off a
remote email server.

You don't even need Pop3 if you are local.

Like you wrote yourself, the "T" is SMTP stands for TRANSFER.

The Microsoft Kool-Aid is botching your definitions...

 

[Ecrsm]

Check out www.smartertools.com (Smartermail 4.0) free for one domain.
It has IMAP, POP3, SMTP and works *very* well. It is written in .NET.

--

Steve Schofield
Windows Server MVP - IIS
ASPInsider Member - MCP

http://www.orcsweb.com/
Managed Complex Hosting
#1 in Service and Support

Hi,

Thanks for the Smartermail plug. Took a loot at it and it is very
intriguing. MailEnable is working very well for me so far, but I was just
in the process of looking for ways to expand upon it such as adding a web
based interface, which I see Smartermail has right out of the box.

Definetly going to give it a run..

Thanks again...

 

[Steve Schofield]

I've used both and Smartermail beats it. You can add domain aliases to your
free domain and have multiple domains resolve to the single inbox. The 4.0
version has Spamassassin built-in, for a low volume domain, this works well.
I've not used 4.0 in a high-volume environment but I have used the 3.x
series and it scales very well.

--

Steve Schofield
Windows Server MVP - IIS
ASPInsider Member - MCP

http://www.orcsweb.com/
Managed Complex Hosting
#1 in Service and Support

 

[Ken Schaefer]

Pop3 is simply a retrieval protocol to pull already delivered email off a
remote email server.

You don't even need Pop3 if you are local.

Like you wrote yourself, the "T" is SMTP stands for TRANSFER.

The Microsoft Kool-Aid is botching your definitions...

Not really. The SMTP server on Windows XP is quite capable of accepting
mail. It is also quite capable of sending mail. That's all that the SMTP
protocol is meant to do.

It seems that you have a rather irrational issue with "Bill" or "M$". If you
wish to get good technical help, please stick to the issues, and avoid all
the rest of the nonsense. There is no need to label things "lame" or "gay"
for example.

Cheers
Ken

 

[Ecrsm]

Not really. The SMTP server on Windows XP is quite capable of accepting
mail.

Ok. Telneting to WinXP Pro's IIS SMTP and entering a "fake" email does show
that it isn't crippled to receive email, but it doesn't get processed after
it is accepted. It goes straight to a bitbucket.

So, my question becpmes "Why doesn't WinXP Pro's IIS have an MDA?"

There is no need to label things "lame" or "gay"

Well, some things just are -- like WinXP Pro not having an MDA when it has
SMTP.

 

[Dave]

if the to: address exists on the machine it should go to the received
folder, any further processing is up to some other tool like a pop3 server.
the smtp server is just for transfering, by itself it doesn't serve mail to
clients or do anything else with them, it just drops them in a folder and
forgets about them.

 

[Ercsm]

if the to: address exists on the machine it should go to the received
folder,

WinXP Pro doesn't do this.

any further processing is up to some other tool like a pop3 server.

Ugh. Pop3 is a retrieval protocol for clients. Why is everyone so obsessed
with Pop3? I could care less about Pop3. It is irrelevant. If you are
using an email server locally (sitting right in front of it), you don't need
Pop3.

The "other tool" you are thinking about is an MDA (Mail Delivery Agent),
which WinXP Pro lacks.

Hence, the rewording of my question to: "Why doesn't WinXP Pro's IIS have an
MDA?"

the smtp server is just for transfering, by itself it doesn't serve mail
to clients or do anything else with them
Yep.

, it just drops them in a folder and forgets about them.

Actually, WinXP Pro's SMTP is crippled in this regard. It does accept
email, but it doesn't drop the accepted email anywhere. They go straight to
a bitbucket -- even though there are inbox mailbox directories created when
SMTP is installed. Probably when they crippled SMTP for WinXP Pro, they
forgot to make it not create the inbox directories.

Incoming mail on WinXP Pro does get accepted by IIS's SMTP, but it doesn't
get saved anywhere for processing by an MDA.

Test it yourself and you will will see. Telnet to it and "write" an email.
It gets accepted, but goes nowhere...

 

[Ercsm]

I've used both and Smartermail beats it. You can add domain aliases to
your free domain and have multiple domains resolve to the single inbox.
The 4.0 version has Spamassassin built-in, for a low volume domain, this
works well. I've not used 4.0 in a high-volume environment but I have used
the 3.x series and it scales very well.

--

Steve Schofield
Windows Server MVP - IIS
ASPInsider Member - MCP

http://www.orcsweb.com/
Managed Complex Hosting
#1 in Service and Support

Hi,

Great package! I'm using SM now.

Thanks again...

 

[Kristofer Gafvert]

All messages destined for locally hosted domains are stored in the drop
folder. That is all SMTP needs to do, there is nothing that says it should
store them in any certain folder acting like "mail boxes".

This works perfectly fine on Windows XP; you have a fully functional SMTP
server. And the emails do get stored somewhere, if it doesn't on your
machine, then your SMTP server is not working properly and you need to fix
that issue.

I don't know why Windows XP does not come with a MDA, but from what i
remember, not even Windows Server 2000 has/had this. So i don't know how
they could "cripple" something that didn't even exist in the first place.
The only MDA i know of that is considered to be part of IIS comes with
Windows Server 2003.

 

[Ercsm]

All messages destined for locally hosted domains are stored in the drop
folder. That is all SMTP needs to do, there is nothing that says it should
store them in any certain folder acting like "mail boxes".

I looked in all the directories while/after writing emails through SMTP
through telnet.
Nothing was being saved anywhere.

Pray tell the exact specific path of "The Drop Folder".

I don't know why Windows XP does not come with a MDA, but from what i
remember, not even Windows Server 2000 has/had this. So i don't know how
they could "cripple" something that didn't even exist in the first place.
The only MDA i know of that is considered to be part of IIS comes with
Windows Server 2003.

WinXP Pro's IIS SMTP is crippled in that it doesn't save accepted emails.

Probably because if it did, one could just download and use a free MDA
program with it.

Instead, they just crippled SMTP so it doesn't save incoming email. It
doesn't even have the courtesy to output a message that accepted emails
won't be saved. Instead, it just acts like they are.

The crippled WinXP Pro IIS SMTP is so users can have a dumb "send me an
email" form on their website. M$ crippled it so that when they decide later
to do more with it (full email server), it won't work. Instead of just
outputing that it doesn't accept email, it fakes that it does. Obviously,
this is by design so that users will call M$ where they can be told that the
only way to get that functionality is to hand over more money to Bill for
Win2K3.

 

[Ken Schaefer]

Ok. Telneting to WinXP Pro's IIS SMTP and entering a "fake" email does
show that it isn't crippled to receive email, but it doesn't get processed
after it is accepted. It goes straight to a bitbucket.

I don't have an XP system right in front of me - but per Kristopher's email,
I believe the mail should go into the "mailbox" folder provider the SMTP
server is configured to accept mail for the To: domain

So, my question becpmes "Why doesn't WinXP Pro's IIS have an MDA?"

So basically you were ranting about something, and you were wrong. Now you
are complaining about something else?

Windows XP doesn't have a lot of things. It doesn't have DVD burner software
(for example). It doesn't have an ISO mounting tool. It doesn't output to
PDF. It doesn't have a network monitoring tool. And so on, and so forth.

Windows 2000 Server/Pro didn't have an MDA either - you need to find a 3rd
party product. That's what keeps the ISV community alive - making products
to sell.

At some point, Microsoft makes a decision about what to include in a
*desktop* OS. The SMTP server is probably there in the Pro version to allow
developers a simple way of testing that their apps can /send/ mail out. If
you want to test receiving mail, I believe that this works as well (again,
this is just "off the top of my head" since I don't have XP in front of me).

If you want to write an application that can test the retrieval of mail,
then install a POP3 server.

So, where does the need for an MDA come in on a desktop OS? Nowhere that I
can see.

Well, some things just are -- like WinXP Pro not having an MDA when it has
SMTP.

No - that has nothing to do with being "lame" or "gay". You tie these
emotional concepts into what is essentially a technical issue. That's simply
irrational. Stick to the technical issues (since they're pretty much
black/white) and we can work through your issue.

Throw in all this emotional stuff, and you will never be satisfied because
you don't have any clear-cut quantitative end-point at which you can say
"I've resolved the problem"

Cheers
Ken

 

[Kristofer Gafvert]

If you have not changed anything from the default settings, the drop
folder is located here:

C:\inetpub\mailroot\drop

I just verified that it sure indeed works to receive emails with the SMTP
server in Windows XP. The following communication with the SMTP server
resulted in an email in the Drop folder:

220 laptop Microsoft ESMTP MAIL Service, Version: 6.0.2600.2180 ready at
Mon, 2
9 Jan 2007 07:34:54 +0100
HELO
500 5.3.3 Unrecognized command
HELO
250 laptop Hello [127.0.0.1]
MAIL FROM:ME@LOCALHOST
250 2.1.0 [email protected] OK
RCPT TO:SOMEONE@laptop
250 2.1.5 SOMEONE@laptop
DATA
354 Start mail input; end with <CRLF>.<CRLF>
EMAIL TO LAPTOP
..
250 2.6.0 <LAPTOP9japjTmD36jfA00000002@laptop> Queued mail for delivery
QUIT
221 2.0.0 laptop Service closing transmission channel


"laptop" is the name of the domain in my SMTP configuration.

This results in the email first being stored in the queue folder, and then
after it has been sent, it is stored in the drop folder. If anything goes
wrong when sending, bad/bdr/bdp files may be stored in the badmail folder.

 

[Uncle Grumpy]

Thought I could use WinXP Pro's SMTP for something useful, but quickly
discovered that it is intentionally cripped to send only.

You're a moron. That's what SMTP is used for, fool.

 

[Ecrsm]

If you have not changed anything from the default settings, the drop
folder is located here:

C:\inetpub\mailroot\drop

I just verified that it sure indeed works to receive emails with the SMTP
server in Windows XP. The following communication with the SMTP server
resulted in an email in the Drop folder:

220 laptop Microsoft ESMTP MAIL Service, Version: 6.0.2600.2180 ready at
Mon, 2
9 Jan 2007 07:34:54 +0100
HELO
500 5.3.3 Unrecognized command
HELO
250 laptop Hello [127.0.0.1]
MAIL FROM:ME@LOCALHOST
250 2.1.0 [email protected] OK
RCPT TO:SOMEONE@laptop
250 2.1.5 SOMEONE@laptop
DATA
354 Start mail input; end with <CRLF>.<CRLF>
EMAIL TO LAPTOP
.
250 2.6.0 <LAPTOP9japjTmD36jfA00000002@laptop> Queued mail for delivery
QUIT
221 2.0.0 laptop Service closing transmission channel


"laptop" is the name of the domain in my SMTP configuration.

This results in the email first being stored in the queue folder, and then
after it has been sent, it is stored in the drop folder. If anything goes
wrong when sending, bad/bdr/bdp files may be stored in the badmail folder.

Hi,

I no longer have anywhere to install IIS's SMTP since I moved on to
something else, but I do believe you about it going to
C:\inetpub\mailroot\drop

I was wrong about it going nowhere, I can admit, and its not a Big Bad Bill
Conspiracy.

Thanks!