SUMMARY

How to debug the antivirus filtering and how to use the MTA agent in debug mode. 

DETAIL

The best way to determine exactly what is occurring with respect to antivirus filtering is to run the Mail Transfer Agent in debug mode. Mail services can be run interactively in debug mode allowing debug messages to be written to the screen. This is particularly useful in diagnosing issues with command line virus scanners called by the MailEnable Mail Transfer Agent.

The following instructions outline how to run the Mail Transfer Agent in debug mode:

1. Stop the MailEnable Mail Transfer Agent Service either using the Windows Service Control Manager or the MailEnable Administration Program.
2. Open the regedit and navigate to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\MailEnable\MailEnable\Agents\MTA\Debug Enabled key.
3. Set the value of this key to 2 (this tells the server to write debug messages to the console rather than to a file).
4. Open the regedit and move to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\MailEnable\MailEnable\Agents\MTA\Activity Log Enabled key.
5. Set the value of this key to 2 (this tells the server to write debug messages to the console rather than to a file).
6. Then, run the Windows command prompt and type in the following commands.

cd \Program Files\Mail Enable\Bin
MEMTA -debug

6. Send some test messages through the server and monitor the output. The command line anti-virus application should initialise and check the messages.
7. Use Control-C to stop the service once some test messages have been sent through the server.
8. When the debug session has completed, close the console window.
9. Make sure that the registry keys specified in steps 1 and 3 are set back to 1 when finished with debug mode.
10. Start the MailEnable Mail Transfer Agent Service either using the Windows Service Control Manager or the MailEnable Administration Program.

MORE INFORMATION

How does antivirus filtering work and how to configure it?: http://www.mailenable.com/kb/content/article.asp?ID=ME020056

How to configure MailEnable's antivirus plug-in: http://www.mailenable.com/kb/content/article.asp?ID=ME020199

Testing MailEnable anti-virus: http://www.mailenable.com/kb/content/article.asp?ID=ME020085