XFOR: Exchange Internet Mail Pickup Directory Usage

• Microsoft Exchange Server, version 5.5

SUMMARY

The Microsoft Exchange Internet Mail Service now provides a directory to allow a "drop-off" for SMTP RFC-821 formatted messages for delivery.

This functionality was added primarily for use with Active Messaging but can be used for other mechanisms and troubleshooting also.

MORE INFORMATION

The Internet Mail Service attempts to create the RFC-821 (SMTP) Mail From and Rcpt To information from the "dropped" message. The preferred source for this information is through the X-Sender and X-Receiver headers normally found in an Active Messaging submission before the RFC-822 header information. If this source is not found, the Internet Mail Service attempts to figure it out from the RFC-822 header information (To, From, Sender). If both the Sender and From fields are present, the Internet Mail Service will take the Sender field over the From field.

If a file is placed in the Pickup directory that the Internet Mail Service (through the Service Account) doesn't have permissions to move or delete, the message will not be delivered. This is to prevent the Internet Mail Service from sending messages multiple times. When this occurs, an event is logged. Also, the Internet Mail Service will not pick up files larger than the maximum message size configured for the Internet Mail Service.

Upon startup, the Internet Mail Service checks for the existence of a Pickup directory under the Imcdata directory and checks for an Archive directory under the Pickup directory. If one does not exist, the Internet Mail Service will attempt to create it. If the Internet Mail Service is unsuccessful at creating these directories, the Pickup directory functionality is disabled. Thus to disable the Pickup functionality, just stop the Internet Mail Service, remove permissions on the Pickup directory, and then restart the Internet Mail Service.

Additional query words: PICKUP REPLAY SMTP RFC-822 RFC-821

Keywords :
Version : winnt:5.5
Platform : winnt
Issue type : kbinfo