Message Transfer Agent Console Commands

The MTA runs on a NetWare, Linux, or Windows file server. It has its own interface, and this section discusses that interface. When the MTA has been successfully loaded on a NetWare server, you see the screen shown in Figure 9.14.

Figure 9.14. The GroupWise MTA console on a NetWare 6.5 server

You can control the NetWare MTA, to some extent, from this screen with keyboard commands. Commands available from the main screen are the following:

• F6: Restart

• F7: Exit

• F9: View Log File

• F10: Options

You will be using these options often when troubleshooting the MTA.

Restarting and Exiting the NetWare MTA

This section offers a brief discussion about the difference between F6 (the Restart option) and F7 (the Exit option). When you press F6, you are prompted to confirm the restart. After confirmation, the agent closes its connections to other servers, stops all processing of transfer files on this server, and rereads configuration information from the domain database. The MTA does not, however, reread the MTA startup file. The MTA startup file is the ASCII file with configuration switches in it.

When you press F7, you are prompted to confirm the exit command. After confirmation, the agent closes all connections and stops processing messages, and GWMTA.NLM unloads. If you then reload the agent from the server console, the MTA will reread the startup file and the configuration information from the domain database.

The F7 keystroke does exactly the same thing that the UNLOAD GWMTA.NLM command does on a NetWare server. If you made changes to the MTA startup file, and you want them to be applied, you must use F7 to exit (or the UNLOAD command), and then reload the MTA manually.

Restarting and Exiting the Linux MTA

Generally the Linux MTA will be configured to run without a visible user interface. Like many Linux programs, the script that loads the Linux MTA supports the following command-line switches, after it has been loaded:

/etc/rc.d/grpwise start /etc/rc.d/grpwise stop /etc/rc.d/grpwise restart /etc/rc.d/grpwise status

Tip

When the MTA is running as a service on a Windows server, and it has been set to interact with the desktop, the F7 option will be grayed out. This is because it is running as a service. To shut down the MTA when it is running as a service, you need to stop that service from running. Open the Services option from the Windows server control panel. From there, you can start and stop the MTA that is running as a Windows service.

The Options Menu

Pressing F10 from the main screen of a NetWare-based MTA presents you with the Options menu, shown in Figure 9.15.

Figure 9.15. The MTA Options menu enables you to look at almost all the functions the MTA performs

The following sections offer an explanation of each of these options in turn.

Configuration Status

The Configuration Status tool, shown in Figure 9.16, is one of the most powerful troubleshooting tools you have. It allows you to look at the status of the MTA's connections with other GroupWise domains, post offices, and gateways, and it tells you why those connections are down if there are problems. It even allows you to suspend connections should you want to prevent communication with another domain, post office, or gateway for some reason.

Figure 9.16. The MTA Configuration Status screen

In Figure 9.16, you find four columns of information, but the interface provides no column headers. From left to right, the column headers would be the following:

• Link Name

• Link Class

• Link Status

• Link Connection or UNC path

Consider the first line of text. The link name here is CORP, and the link class is Domain. This means that this line represents this MTA's link to the CORP domain. The link status is Open, and the link path is wwwfs1/sys:\corp. This means that this MTA can successfully write to this path on the wwwfs1 file server.

In this example, this first line of text is a special one. It defines this MTA's link to its home directory. This MTA is running against the CORP domain database, servicing the CORP domain, so the Corp link shows up as the UNC path to the WPDOMAIN.DB file.

In Figure 9.17, the MFG link is highlighted and the Enter key has been pressed.

Figure 9.17. The MTA Link Options menu

Three options are presented on this menu:

• Details: This option brings up a window showing the details for the selected link.

• Resume: This option resumes service for this link, if someone previously suspended it, or the link was closed because of communication problems of some sort.

• Suspend: This option discontinues service for this link. Service will not be resumed until Resume is selected or until the MTA is restarted.

Figure 9.18 shows that the link status for domain MFG is open. Here's how to check out a link. Selecting Details for the MFG link presents the screen shown in Figure 9.18.

Figure 9.18. The MTA Link Details window

Here's a look at each of the fields available in this window:

• MTP/HOME: This field shows the IP address of the MTA, or it shows the home directory, or link path, for this link. This can be a server path or it can be an IP address and port. If it is a UNC path, the line that reads MTP in Figure 9.18 will say HOME instead.

• Hold: This field displays the directory that the MTA uses to queue up files destined for this domain if the home path is not accessible (that is, the link is down). Large numbers of files can queue up in this hold directory if the link stays down for an extended period.

  Tip

  You can easily see whether there are messages in an MTA's hold queue from the HTTP interface of the MTA under Links.

  
  

• Pull: If you have configured the MTA for transfer pull, as described earlier in this chapter, the transfer pull path is listed here.

• Version: This field shows the version of the domain, post office, or gateway that the MTA is connecting to. This information is required so that the MTA can properly format transfer files for older versions of GroupWise.

• Current Status: This line indicates whether the link is open or closed.

• Last Closed: This field displays the date on which this link was last closed. If the link has not been closed since the MTA was last restarted, this field is blank.

• Last Opened: This field is the date on which this link was last opened. Again, it is tracked only since this MTA was last restarted.

• Last Closure Reason: Here is a big reason for visiting this screen in the first place. The MTA will indicate why a link is closed. For example, an MTA could complain that it cannot create files, which means it has insufficient rights to the directory in question, or perhaps the directory in question does not exist.

• Messages Written: This field shows the number of messages transferred to this link.

• Messages Read: This field is the number of messages received on this link. If the link is TCP/IP, it will typically be 0 unless the connection is via UNC. Messages delivered to this MTA via UNC paths are not tracked on this screen.

From the information presented, you should be able to quickly determine the nature of a link problem. You will still need to perform some troubleshooting, but this screen will narrow your field of possibilities quite nicely.

Admin Status

When Admin Status is selected from the Options menu, a window similar to the one shown in Figure 9.19 appears. Some of the lines in this window allow user interaction, whereas some are purely informative.

Figure 9.19. The MTA Admin Status window

Following are descriptions of the fields in the Admin Status window:

• Completed: This first line, listed under the Admin Messages heading, indicates how many admin messages have been successfully written to the domain database since the MTA was loaded.

• Errors: This entry indicates how many errors have occurred when attempting to perform administrative transactions on the domain database. Errors in this column are not typically associated with domain database damage, though. They usually occur when domains are out of sync, and this domain receives a transaction that it cannot perform, such as adding a user who already exists or deleting a nonexistent user.

  Tip

  If you upgrade a GroupWise domain to a new version, after the MTA has recovered the MTA, it will report one error. This is normal, and there is no need to be concerned about this error.

  
  

• In Queue: This line is a count of the admin messages awaiting processing. If lots of administration traffic is taking place (say, you just imported 2,000 users), you can expect a positive number here for a while. Usually it should be 0.

• Send Admin Mail: This line is interactive. Pressing Enter allows you to toggle between No and Yes. This option governs whether the MTA sends email to the administrator of this domain when there are errors.

• Status: There are two status lines. This one, under the Admin Database heading, tells the status of the domain database. During an automatic recovery, the database can be locked against changes. This status should always read Normal.

• DB Sort Language: This is the language used to sort the address book.

• Recovery Count: This is the number of times since the MTA has been loaded that the MTA has run a recovery against the domain database. This number should always be 0. If it is not, you have had domain database damage at some point (or perhaps you have manually triggered a recovery, described later in this section).

• Automatic Recovery: This line is interactive. Pressing Enter allows you to toggle between Yes and No. In most cases, you will want to leave this set to Yes, thus allowing the MTA to recover the domain database if it encounters a structural error during transactions. If the MTA is restarted, this setting is not remembered; it is reread from the domain database. Permanent changes to this setting should be made to the MTA object from ConsoleOne.

• Perform DB Recovery: This is another interactive line; pressing Enter here allows you to spawn a database recovery. This option can be useful when you suspect that the database is damaged.

• Status: This second status line indicates the status of the admin thread of the MTA. This line is interactive; press Enter to toggle between Running and Suspended. One common reason to suspend the admin thread is to prevent updates from taking place during an offline rebuild of the domain database. While the fresh database is being created, you want administrative changes to be queued up. Otherwise, they will be written to the current database, which is going to be replaced.

You will most likely use the information in the Admin Status screen when troubleshooting problems with directory synchronization in your GroupWise system.

Active Log Window

The main screen for the MTA shows what appears to be an active log, but all that is logged to the main screen are global sorts of messages. To see the blow-by-blow log, you need to select Active Log Window from the Options menu.

This is the active log for the MTA. Log entries here indicate the time of the operation, the thread name that performed the operation, and a description of the operation. This chapter discusses the interpretation of the MTA logs later, in the section "Understanding the MTA Log."

View Log Files

If the information you are looking for in the MTA log is not in the currently active log, you need to select View Log Files.

Selecting one of the log files listed and pressing Enter brings up a viewing window so you can browse that log file.

Tip

It is much easier to view the log files from the HTTP interface to the GroupWise agents, rather than from the MTA console screen. You will find it more readable and interactive. You can also use the browser's Find functionality to find specific information you might be looking for when you use the HTTP option to view the log files.

Log Settings

You can use the Log Settings dialog box to change the logging level, the age of log files, and the space taken up by log files on-the-fly.

These settings are not retained after a restart, however. If you want to change the logging options permanently, make your changes from ConsoleOne, and then execute a restart (F6) on the MTA to force it to reread configuration information in the domain database.

Cycle Log

This command forces the MTA to begin writing to a new log file. This option is useful when the current log file needs to be moved or edited by another application (that is, opened in WordPad so that a Find operation can be performed).

Live Remote Status

This option lists GroupWise remote or cache client users who are connected to the MTA, along with the post offices and domains that the MTA communicates with in order to service the remote or cache client users. If you have more interest in live remote, read the section later in this chapter called "Configuring the MTA to Support Live Remote."

Edit Startup File

This option brings up the startup file for the MTA. You can enable and configure switches from the MTA's startup file. It is best to configure the MTA through ConsoleOne rather than through switches in the MTA. The only switches you might want to add are the "undocumented" switches mentioned in the next section.