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abbeyvet
Posts: 5095
From: Kilkenny Ireland
Status: offline
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Form Problem - 11/20/2002 8:35:44
I have a form (not an FP form, it is using a form handler from here: http://www.jimmelanson.ca/mpfh/index.shtml) on a site that sends results to 3 recipients and also generates an autoresponse to the person who submitted it.
It is sending to the recipients fine but only some of the autoresponses are arriving at their destination. For example if I enter one of my email addresses, I get a response, if I enter another, I don' t.
The form is here: http://www.irelandescorted.com/booking_enquiries.htm
I wonder if any of you would have time to test it and let me know if you get an email in reply?
And would anyone have any idea why this might be happening?
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Katherine
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erinatkins
Posts: 3072
From: Mechanicsville VA USA
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 9:08:15
Katherine,
I got email back (listed below). I am not sure why it is not working at times. Sorry
Erin
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Dear Erin Atkins
Thank you for your request for more information about our Tours. You can find out more about both Private and Small Group tours in 2003 at this address: http://www.irelandescorted.com/2003
There is extensive information there, but if you have any questions please do not hesitate to contact us, we will be happy to discuss the particular requirments of your group with you and to do all we can to assist in your planning.
I hope we will be welcoming you to Ireland soon and look forward to meeting you!
Best regards,
Michael
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All Hail Great Spooky - Master of the Outfront Forums. He can make you or break you.
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_gail
Posts: 2876
From: So FL
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 9:40:31
Tried the form three more times, this time placing a web based email address and two aol addresses. The one response was received, still no responses to any of the three form submissions for AOL addresses.
This is a biggie; no matter what most techie folk think about AOL, the number of users is humongous. If it will at all help or is relevant, let me know if I can contact AOL support for you.
gail
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erinatkins
Posts: 3072
From: Mechanicsville VA USA
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 9:44:21
Katherine,
Gail made a good point. Not getting mail to AOL would be a biggie.
Is it possible AOL is blocking IP?
Erin
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All Hail Great Spooky - Master of the Outfront Forums. He can make you or break you.
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abbeyvet
Posts: 5095
From: Kilkenny Ireland
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 10:02:05
This is what I was afraid of - it is more than a biggie, it is ENORMOUS!
Thanks.
I would be really interested to know if there are places other than AOL where mail is not being received.
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Katherine
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_gail
Posts: 2876
From: So FL
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 10:08:04
quote:
ORIGINAL: erinatkins
Is it possible AOL is blocking IP?
What does this mean? And why would they?
gail
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abbeyvet
Posts: 5095
From: Kilkenny Ireland
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 10:15:44
Geerally such a block would be for reasons of spam, a server would be blocked if it has been detected as sending spam.
However this is my own server, it is never used for spamming and never has been.
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Katherine
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abbeyvet
Posts: 5095
From: Kilkenny Ireland
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 10:31:36
Looking into this another reason that AOL and others might block is if the mail is coming from a domain that is on a server which allows open relay mail, but this server does not allow relay mail, and I have checked that it is not listed inaccurately anywhere as one that does.
Quote from http://ordb.org
quote:
The server explicitly rejected all probes, and has been deemed secure by the ORDB testing engine.
This is a pain.
< Message edited by abbeyvet -- 11/20/2002 10:35:34 AM >
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Katherine
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erinatkins
Posts: 3072
From: Mechanicsville VA USA
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 10:38:48
Katherine,
Is AOl still using RuleSpace for filtering - parental controls & blocking?
What about their spam filters? You could email them to ask if there was a reason they are blocking it. Could be accident.
We had a problem once & it was an error.
Erin
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All Hail Great Spooky - Master of the Outfront Forums. He can make you or break you.
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erinatkins
Posts: 3072
From: Mechanicsville VA USA
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 12:38:30
Katherine,
Please let us know the results of this. I am very interested in what caused this.
Thanks
Erin
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All Hail Great Spooky - Master of the Outfront Forums. He can make you or break you.
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_gail
Posts: 2876
From: So FL
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 12:43:25
quote:
ORIGINAL: abbeyvet
I would be really interested to know if there are places other than AOL where mail is not being received.
I' m visiting and tried two other email addresses. Both received the automated replies immediately. One was a mindspring.com account, the other email address was through a hosting site (using mindspring as isp).
Still no responses to my two aol addresses.
I did contact AOL' s online support and they were not very helpful. For what it' s worth, they suggested a report be submitted. Here' s the info they want:
AOLTechHYD: FULL NAME,ISP' s DOMAIN NAME,
AOLTechHYD: DATE/TIME PROBLEM STARTED
AOLTechHYD: EMAIL ADDRESS
AOLTechHYD: IS THE PROBLEM (CONSISTENT/INTERMITTENT)
AOLTechHYD: PROBLEM DESCRIPTION
AOLTechHYD: DAYTIME PHONE
AOLTechHYD: DID THE MAIL BOUNCE BACK (YES/NO):
AOLTechHYD: HOST NAME OF MAIL SERVER USED TO RELAY MAIL TO AOL
AOLTechHYD: IP ADDRESS OF MAIL SERVER USED TO RELAY MAIL TO AOL
AOLTechHYD: Send the e-mail to: support@aol.net
gail
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abbeyvet
Posts: 5095
From: Kilkenny Ireland
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 13:41:49
This is utterly doing my head in and I am coming up against a brick wall.
I can only conclude after a day spent fruitlessly chasing this up that AOL is a poisonous organisation who not only does not deliver all mail to its customers but fails to tell either them or the sender of the mail that iit is not being delivered, let alone why.
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Katherine
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_gail
Posts: 2876
From: So FL
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 14:17:16
quote:
ORIGINAL: abbeyvet
I can only conclude after a day spent fruitlessly chasing this up that AOL is a poisonous organisation
Unfortunately, my experience is that their first level of support at AOL is not good beyond basic things such as how to use their Instant Messaging system and stuff like that. I' ve found you have to get on the phone and INSIST that you speak with a higher level of tech support.
Now this has gotten me really mad because it means I' m probably not getting all the mail people send me! And I' ve been an AOL customer a long time and have recommended it to many.
If you can' t contact AOL in your country and if you' d like me to give it a shot here, email me questions you' d like discussed.
gail
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podunkpolecat
Posts: 16
From: None
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 15:42:07
FWIW I usually cringe when I have to forward information to an AOL address. Even links don' t work much of the time. Much of the material I have tried to send contains pictures (Florida real estate) and I' ve pretty much given up sending anything bulky. One thing I have added to messages containing links is a warning that AOL users often have difficulties receiving info and if links don' t work, they should try copy and pasting to their browser.
pp
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abbeyvet
Posts: 5095
From: Kilkenny Ireland
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 16:13:52
quote:
If you can' t contact AOL in your country and if you' d like me to give it a shot here, email me questions you' d like discussed.
Thanks for the offer Gail, my understanding is that AOL could care less and that given that I am a non customer they are not going to be of any real help at all.
AOL in Ireland practically does not exist - they have a big presence here but it is serving a market in the US, I know of nobody on AOL in Ireland, I am not really sure it is even available.
I have never understood the attraction of AOL and I understand it less than ever now.
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Katherine
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MCD
Posts: 664
Joined: 3/19/2002
From: Al USA
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 18:00:00
Katherine, I received a response back immediatly on my Direcway account. Hope that helps.
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Kitka
Posts: 2515
Joined: 1/31/2002
From: Australia
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 19:39:19
quote:
I wonder if any of you would have time to test it and let me know if you get an email in reply?
Katherine, I just tested the form to an address with my local ISP and a response came almost immediately.
One thing to consider though, is that it came in all html, and I use a plain text e-mail program. However, it was quite readable, as the coding involved is minimal - unlike some sent from Hotmail etc.
Good luck solving the AOL problem!
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Kitka
**It is impossible to make anything foolproof because fools are so ingenious.**
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_gail
Posts: 2876
From: So FL
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 19:50:52
quote:
ORIGINAL: Kitka
Good luck solving the AOL problem!
I just tested this again with an entirely new aol account, and did NOT receive a response. I just contacted a friend in another state with an AOL account and have her testing it too.
I know Katherine didn' t indicate that she wanted me to contact AOL but I did. I' m waiting for an email report back from them. One of the things that I, er, ever so kindly pointed out was that this problem could adversely effect someone' s business.
As an example, I helped test a gentlemen' s tourist site for him in several AOL browsers. He is from England and his site is geared to English tourists who wish to go to Disney World in Central Florida. He told me at the time that more than 60% of his visitors use AOL. I also note that the site Katherine references seems geared to a large degree to the American tourist visiting Ireland.
[edit]Hey, if about 60% are not receiving replies to filling in forms, that' s a lot of folk. And you know who will get blamed? Not AOL but the site owner and/or the web designer [/edit]
Whatever AOL is doing, or not doing, needs to be fixed.
gail
< Message edited by _gail -- 11/20/2002 8:07:55 PM >
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Kitka
Posts: 2515
Joined: 1/31/2002
From: Australia
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 20:32:00
quote:
web sites have been filled with things like " AOL users click here" for as long as I can remember.
As an extension to this idea: why not attach a pop-up containing the text of your e-mail to a link on the form saying: " AOL users click here" ? Then say something like " we apologise for this technical difficulty with AOL, but we are totally dependant on AOL sorting things out at their end" .
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Kitka
**It is impossible to make anything foolproof because fools are so ingenious.**
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AMysticWeb
Posts: 855
Joined: 10/23/2002
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/20/2002 22:26:51
I too have had problems in the past with AOL receiving form mail.
If I remember correctly, 5.0 and 6.0 had more problems with this than 7.0. I tried 8.0 recently and some of my test form submissions took over an hour.
In the past, I would send the form to info@mysite.com and forward to AOL. This always worked.
Now I send a backup to a Yahoo account in case I don' t get the AOL mail.
So far I have had luck with 7.0 receiving text form submissions. Sometimes it takes a couple of minutes.
You might take a look at this
http://postmaster.info.aol.com/index.cfm?article=13&expand=0&sitenum=7&menuid=14
& this
http://members.aol.com/adamkb/aol/mailfaq/
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Hope I have been of some help,
Micheal
[URL=http://web.archive.org/web/20060101013129/http://www.frontpageforms.com/]FrontPageForms.com-Archive Version[/URL]
I am living Proof that Viral Procrastination exists!
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abbeyvet
Posts: 5095
From: Kilkenny Ireland
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/21/2002 5:39:31
quote:
I know Katherine didn' t indicate that she wanted me to contact AOL but I did
Thanks Gail, I appreciate it. If you hear anything let me know.
quote:
I sure hope you slept well!
I did thank you, I slept the sleep of the truely exhausted. I feel as if AOL stole a day of my life!!
quote:
I don' t think you can say you have a " non-functional site" - it is only AOL users who are affected, isn' t it?
You are quite right of course, but as Gail says this site is aimed mainly at the US market. Looking back over emails sent to it in the past there were a very high number using AOL email addresses so it is a major issue. I am just about to add those " AOL users click here" links, but it would be soooo much better if I did not have to.
Thanks for the links Tom, I think by now I must have read more about the prolems of AOL mail than almost anyone living, it keeps reinforcing to me, the more I read, that AOL will do as they please and to hell with the problems it causes either for their users or for anyone trying to do business with their users. Putting the term " AOL users please" into Google is very interesting!
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Katherine
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_gail
Posts: 2876
From: So FL
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/21/2002 7:46:29
My friend filled out the form at the Ireland Tour site and didn' t receive any reply. Now another AOL subscriber is livid.
There are really two significant issues here:
1) AOL users not receiving all their mail, including some they voluntarily request;
2) loss of income for businesses whose customers and potential customers pay AOL for email service.
If the US Post Office filtered my mail (as opposed to me filtering my own mail) it could very well be considered blatant censorship or even mail tampering, which I believe is a federal offense here.
quote:
I feel as if AOL stole a day of my life!!
Well, I' m not going to let AOL steal a day of my life, so if anyone knows of one link which most succinctly summarizes the known problem, please post it here. I don' t want to read all this stuff.
What I am going to do though with that info is include it in personal letters to Stephen Case, AOL Chairman, and CEO Richard Parsons. I' m not confident that any email reply I get from AOL tech support will address the problem, but will let you know Katherine if I do hear from any of these folk.
I was thinking about starting a new thread to request that Outfronters bombard AOL with letters and email about this situation, but I' m not sure it is allowed in these forums. So I won' t until I contact Spooky to find out if it' s okay.
gail 
Stephen Case, Chairman
Richard Parsons, CEO
AOL Time Warner Inc.
75 Rockefeller Plaza
New York, NY 10019
Phone: (212) 484-8000
Fax: (212) 489-6183
Email: aoltimewarnerir@aol.com
< Message edited by _gail -- 11/21/2002 9:36:47 AM >
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erinatkins
Posts: 3072
From: Mechanicsville VA USA
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/21/2002 8:29:16
Katherine,
If people are forwarding mail it will not work -http://www.macnn.com/news.php?id=12430
Erin
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All Hail Great Spooky - Master of the Outfront Forums. He can make you or break you.
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abbeyvet
Posts: 5095
From: Kilkenny Ireland
Status: offline
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RE: Form Problem - 11/21/2002 8:45:45
Thank you once again all.
I now have a notice up alerting AOL users to the problem (and incorporating your wording Kitka, thank you) and that will have to do for now.
It seems that largely the problem lies in the fact that the emails are being generated by a form autoresponse through sendmail. Because a lot of spam is autogenerated in this way this sort of mail is treated with suspicion by AOL.
The basic problem is that they make no differenciation between one autogenerated mail and another - this mail (like many other legitimate mails) is autogenerated once only, in reponse to the users request and their email address is not stored as a result. The site has a comprehensive privacy policy in this respect. But of course that is irrelevane as a machine in AOL has decided it is BAD.
What really annoys me is that the user is not even alerted that a mail was not delivered, it would just appear that they asked for information and nobody bothered to send it. Also I KNOW there must be a way around it at so much spam does get though to AOL users, their systems are certainly not fool proof in that regard.
In addition to the warnign to AOL users, I have also caused the form in question and another one to now generate a message to us, telling us someone looked for information. We do not really need to know this, but it does mean that if someone does submit a request using an aol address, we will be alerted to it and can contact them directly. I hate doing this, as I do not really want to be getting into bothering people who just wanted to see a little more.
The reason that the email address is asked for at all there is that my client is not keen on having pricing information all that easily available to his competitors. He originally wanted to get people to use a username and password to see it, I have been working on persuading him to put fewer barriers in peoples way. This was intended to be very simple, we just ask for their email and email them the access info. I know anyone, any competitor, could easily request it but it makes my client feel a little better.
I wish I could just persuade him to let people in and the hell if his competitors know his prices. However other forms, booking forms in particular, are also using this form handler. I like it, I like what it can do, I have spent a long time setting up the various forms and I really, REALLY, REALLY, do not want to have to do it all over again another way.
< Message edited by abbeyvet -- 11/21/2002 8:46:58 AM >
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Katherine
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Printable Version 
How long has this been going on? I sure receive enough unsolicited, c*** mail every day through their channels, but when I fill out a form and request information, I do not receive it?![:' (] 
