TXP install user account emails do not arrive

jayrope · 2025-11-28 21:44:27

Hi all,

I’ve a weird problem here with a client site (TXP 4.88 on PHP 8.1): User account emails do not arrive.
It’s been confirmed, that the sending domain isn’t blocked on the receiver site and DNS records are fine.

Emails from the backend upon account creation (or sending password resets) are reported to be sent fine, there is no errors in my install.
Yet respective emails do not arrive, even when i use one of my own accounts elsewhere (gmail or sthg.)

Where else could i look for troubles or what’s a good way to debug this problem?

Thanks a lot in advance!

Bloke · 2025-11-28 22:29:10

I have the same issue. Even on 4.9.0. And I’ve no idea why.

Messages to my own domain (the one hosted on the server) are fine and come through to my webmail account, but anything else the system generates – password resets, login invites, etc – always disappear. DKIM, SPF and DMARC are all set up, mxtoolbox claims everything is fine, but they just… never arrive. And when I look in the mail error log, there they are, piling up, rejected by the recipient domain for random reasons like a spam score of > 3.4 or something.

No change if I mess around with the envelope header settings either.

Also, once I’ve sent an email (e.g. from a contact form) from someone and it bounces, the next time a message is composed from the same sender, it doesn’t even attempt to send. Just sits there dumbly when you press Submit. No errors, no nothing, just… like it’s a dead button.

Sending email is getting near impossible unless you pay for it, which I’m loathe to do for things like my domain. All it takes is some script kiddie to launch a sustained attack on one of my sites with smd_prognostics installed and I’ll get 4000 emails – one from each attempt – and a bill for every message.

I keep meaning to see if I can tweak the plugin to only mail once every so many hours, with a ‘digest’ of the issues missed (according to a pref frequency) but I keep finding other stuff to do instead.

So, sorry, no actual “fix” suggestion. It does seem to be provider/domain specific.

Bloke · 2025-11-28 22:36:44

One thing you can do, btw, is put the site in debugging mode. You may get additional info speewed out or in the page source.

On 4.9.0, btw, in debugging mode, you get an smtp_log file created in your temp dir with all the exchange info between client and server. That makes it a lot easier to diagnose this kind of thing.

Bloke · 2025-11-28 22:37:17

One thing you can do, btw, is put the site in debugging mode. You may get additional info spewed out, or in the page source.

On 4.9.0, btw, in debugging mode, you get an smtp_log file created in your temp dir with all the exchange info between client and server. That makes it a lot easier to diagnose this kind of thing.

jakob · 2025-11-28 22:45:18

How about hooking it up to an email relaying service in-between?

Something like smtp2go, Postmark, ImprovMX or ForwardMX. I think most of those have a free low-volume plan. Certainly you could test with them. I have a host that has no own email and provides Postmark for sending transactional emails and ImprovMX for allowing email submissions in lieu of that. I’ve tested that before and it worked by using Postmarks SMTP details via the advanced email settings in txp v4.9.

EDIT: Actually, the site using Postmark that I can recall uses zcr_postmark and the API rather than SMTP to send mails from Textpattern. That plugin is from zcr… days so may need minor adaptations to match the new callbacks in com_connect.

Bloke · 2025-11-28 22:55:42

I don’t even remember adopting zcr_postmark, let alone any of the code. Sheesh. Only ten years ago too.

jayrope · 2025-11-30 13:13:36

Thank you Bloke and Jakob for your ideas.

My hosting suggests: “you will need to create an email account under yourdomain.com and configure SMTP within your CMS using that email account”.

Is that possible?
Apparently TXP otherwise uses an internal email address basically resembling sthg like username@ourmaindomain.com – but for all domains hosted on my account it is that same address.
I assume, that this could be a default phpmailer address?

In any case this address got flagged as spam apparently (which is crap, because it ONLY sends TXP user accounts)

jayrope · 2025-11-30 13:15:06

Bloke wrote #341395:

One thing you can do, btw, is put the site in debugging mode. You may get additional info spewed out, or in the page source.

On 4.9.0, btw, in debugging mode, you get an smtp_log file created in your temp dir with all the exchange info between client and server. That makes it a lot easier to diagnose this kind of thing.

I did find a mail_log in my Cpanel backend, which let’s me see the errors, too. Debug mode (on 4.88) didn’t show me much (though a ton of other errors ;)

Last edited by jayrope (2025-11-30 13:16:15)

Bloke · 2025-11-30 13:19:11

jayrope wrote #341408:

you will need to create an email account under yourdomain.com and configure SMTP within your CMS using that email account. Is that possible?

Not in 4.8.8, sadly. Only 4.9.0+ has external SMTP ability.

jayrope · 2025-11-30 14:08:38

Bloke wrote #341410:

Not in 4.8.8, sadly. Only 4.9.0+ has external SMTP ability.

Is that already usable? And I am wondering how many addons I’d render useless, when updating… hmm hmm

Bloke · 2025-11-30 15:23:57

It’s more than usable. I’ve had it running on live sites for over a year while we’re still tinkering.

jayrope · 2025-12-01 21:34:41

Bloke wrote #341412:

It’s more than usable. I’ve had it running on live sites for over a year while we’re still tinkering.

Okay you convinced me, thank you. I updated to the beta2 of v 4.90 – update went mostly well.

- will report further

Last edited by jayrope (2025-12-01 21:35:24)

jayrope · 2025-12-06 10:05:50

@bloke Okay, here’s interesting info from my server support, “Use enhanced email features” is required to be used, when outgoing spam protection is strict:

__”…the option “Use enhanced mail features?” is currently set to No. This seems root cause of the issue. When this is disabled, Textpattern relies on the server’s default PHP mail function rather than an authenticated connection. This often causes the script to dynamically pull the triggering user’s details … into the headers, creating that “From” vs. “Envelope” mismatch that MailChannels (comment: the outgoing spam protection) is blocking.

Please toggle that setting to Yes. Once enabled, you will see new fields appear for SMTP Host, Username, and Password. Please input the specific credentials for the [TXP sender] account there. This will force the CMS to authenticate strictly as the no-reply user, ensuring the headers remain consistent and allowing the emails to pass through our filters.”__

The insight to default PHP mail function is notable and could indicate certain issues i had before with contact forms being used to send out spam – if circumventing PHP mail will resolve the 4.90 beta2 issues will be seen here in a little while. I’ll further report then.

Additionally to be noted for users on shared hosts with different domains and subdomains using TXP:

Using just one catch-all email account for TXP installs is permittable and even to be preferred, says my support. This is GOOD, as it minimizes maintenance drastically after updating to a 4.9 beta2 or later.
I expect some rounds of servicing beforehand, though.

Last edited by jayrope (2025-12-06 10:06:15)

jayrope · 2025-12-06 14:08:07

Dear @bloke

I could make it work as was described in my post right before! Let me know, if I can assist you with this myself!

Last edited by jayrope (2025-12-06 14:08:37)

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