Email causing MailScanner to go defunct.

[Kai Schaetzl]

Steve Campbell wrote on Fri, 23 Jan 2009 11:42:41 -0500:

> Max Spam Check Size = 4000k
> Max SpamAssassin Size = 2500000

Ah, ok, I confused these two settings, or, actually, I somehow wasn't aware 
that there were two. Maybe at the time I "learned" MailScanner.conf there was 
only one of them. Anyway, scanning such big messages in completeness is most 
certainly having a dramatic impact on performance and memory usage of SA/MS.

Set this back to:
Max SpamAssassin Size = 200k
and leave the other as is. That should help you a lot.

There's really no point in scanning the big messages completely. If the 
message is spam SA should almost certainly be able to know this from the 
first lines.

> 
> High value, but like I said, there was a time when emails weren't 
> delivered if it were above.

you mean, if *they* were above? Unfortunately, you didn't debug this. Either 
there was a bug then or you misinterpreted something.

> I'm only using sbl-xbl-spamhaus.org right now with my MTA. I've never 
> compared rejected versus accepted, but when I tail my maillog, it seems 
> as though most email is thrown away. If anyone has a safe suggestion for 
> more that I should add to the MTA, please suggest. A lot of my incoming 
> is from bursts from news agencies sending alerts to all reporters.

There's a lot of things one can do at the MTA level and using an RBL is just 
one of them. It depends on the software, clientele, needs etc. Each one is 
different.

> There were a lot of failed modules during install. The two main ones 
> installed fine. MS says it installed fine. I'm just wondering if that 
> might have a bearing on this as I'm running Centos 3 here.

Oh. Yeah, this might have an impact as well. I remember someone else with 
RHEL 3 reported a lot of failed modules during installation recently. I 
replied with a recommendation to her. Apparently most modules could not be 
built. This can mean a lot or almsot nothing. It depends on the fact if you 
have these modules already installed or not.

Kai

-- 
Kai Schätzl, Berlin, Germany
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