Scan Inbound Mail incompatibility problem

[Alistair]

Just thought I would mention that the incoming scanner seems to be a bit invasive in that it blocks out the service wanting to use. EG I am a programmer, and have written a program called 'spamdel' when spamdel wants to read the message it firstly gets the message number (GetUIDLList) then reads the desired text. Similarly to delete a message it GetUIDLList then delete desired message. Problem is when GetUIDLList, Avast blocks the port and program hangs. Without incoming scanning programs work fine. I expect this issue to be a common one with any program wanting the POP3 port, and would be hard to overcome, as many servers only have one port dedicated to POP3. Maybe there is a method around it, but not apparent to me.
Alistair+

[Lisandro]

Yes, there is a workaround.
Just add the name of the GetUIDLList process to be excluded from scanning.
Click 'Settings' in my signature than browse for the [MailScanner] section. You'll find there how to exclude it.
Another possibility is redirecting avast to scan other port number than the spam killer application (Redirection tab of Internet Mail provider settings).
Welcome to the most configurable antivirus round 

[Alistair]

Yes, there is a workaround.
Just add the name of the GetUIDLList process to be excluded from scanning.
Click 'Settings' in my signature than browse for the [MailScanner] section. You'll find there how to exclude it.
Another possibility is redirecting avast to scan other port number than the spam killer application (Redirection tab of Internet Mail provider settings).
Welcome to the most configurable antivirus round 

Superb, just one problem. Most users would not be aware of these settings, and could not be bothered changing them. I believe Norton anti-virus has an 'ask the user to allow' method. If u are the programmer, could you please consider adding this feature in to a future release. I suspect you have one of the most popular freeware antiv progs, and it would be nice if it would help, not hinder other programs in their use of the net. IMHO ;-)

[Alistair]

Yes, there is a workaround.
Just add the name of the GetUIDLList process to be excluded from scanning.
Click 'Settings' in my signature than browse for the [MailScanner] section. You'll find there how to exclude it.
Another possibility is redirecting avast to scan other port number than the spam killer application (Redirection tab of Internet Mail provider settings).
Welcome to the most configurable antivirus round 

Sorry, cannot for the life of me find any string entry in the [Mailscanner] section which is similar to you describe. Could you enlighten me with an example? The only thing vaguely like the job looked to be PassThrough=1 which is not suitable.
Al+

[DavidR]

Add a new line IgnoreProcess if it doesn't exist in the [Mailscanner] section. I have done this to exclude/ignore MailWasher.exe and I added the line directly below the [Mailscanner] section start.

IgnoreProcess=GetUIDLList (or what ever the executable filename is)

[Lisandro]

Superb, just one problem. Most users would not be aware of these settings, and could not be bothered changing them. I believe Norton anti-virus has an 'ask the user to allow' method. If u are the programmer, could you please consider adding this feature in to a future release. I suspect you have one of the most popular freeware antiv progs, and it would be nice if it would help, not hinder other programs in their use of the net. IMHO ;-)

I'm not a programmer... I do not work for Alwil company... I'm just an user like you.
They're adding GUI for changing settings little by little by users' ask.
Anyway, please, never compare our beloved avast! with Norton. Norton is not the minimal part configurable as avast...
Norton is a big black closed box... 

Sorry, cannot for the life of me find any string entry in the [Mailscanner] section which is similar to you describe.

Follow David 
In the first post of that thread I've wrote that you must add the lines that you don't have...

[lukor]

Alistair, the problem probably lies in the way your program communicates via POP3 protocol. The IgnoreProcess trick would probably work, but it should NOT be necessary.

Mail Scanner redirect your communication with server and scans the communication. If you just get the UIDList, you probably would not transmit any data that might be scanned. Anyway your program spamdel speaks with Internet Mail scanner instead of the destination server.

How does the communication looks like? Do you login, getUIDList and logout? Or do you send the command and block until the result is returned? Enable logging in Mail Scanner and decipher from the log what does Mail Scanner receive and how does it understand the commands.

There are two possibilities:
1) your program is BAD - meaning it does not speak proper POP3
2) Mail Scanner does not understand the commands used by your program even though they are correct

If 2) is the case and your are speaking correct POP3 according to POP3 RFC we should probably modify Mail Scanner to understand your commands. If 1) is the case, well you know what to do...    Fix it. For example do you use \r\n to terminate the line (just like RFC requests) or just plain \n (WRONG) ?
 

Anyway, post here the transcript of the communication (e.g. when simulated in telnet), and send me or vojtech the logfile from Mail Scanner and we will find out where the problem is.

[Alistair]

How does the communication looks like? Do you login, getUIDList and logout? Or do you send the command and block until the result is returned? Enable logging in Mail Scanner and decipher from the log what does Mail Scanner receive and how does it understand the commands.

Appreciate. Can u send me a PIM with your email adds and I will return findings.
Re above, I log in then get the UID list. I also log in and read headers and that part works OK through the mail scanner so there is something different in the outgoing protocol with some operations like UID and delete message that MScanner does not like there.

BTW just a thought, you have a nice help file, but pressing F1 in On-Access protection control, and other interfaces does not restore it.

[lukor]

use the email from my public profile.

[Alistair]

With the log, I cannot get any i/o information. EG when the scanner is activated by my email program, nothing is logged even in debug or info. Am I missing something, or are standard i/o ignored, but problems are posted to the log. If the latter that is a pity, as debug would have shown me the difference between a working I/O from my program to the opposite.
Alistair+
PS keeping this thread public as others might be wanting to work with Avast similarly.

[lukor]

Have you enabled logging in the Mail Scanner (by adding the line log=20 into the Mailscanner section of avast4.ini)

[MailScanner]
Log=20

Edit: BTW you can post your spamdel, I can check what does it send...

Edit2: Of course you need to restart Mail Scanner before and then terminate Mail Scanner after your trial - in order to flush the log on disk a make it available for reading.

[Alistair]

=>Have you enabled logging in the Mail Scanner (by adding the line log=20 into the Mailscanner section of avast4.ini)
No will do; I had assumed it was in the log interface setup :-(
=> BTW you can post your spamdel, I can check what does it send...
OK, its url is
http://www.spamdel.com
or download
http://www.spamdel.com/spamdel.exe
Does not put anything into registry (uses INI files) so you can install & Uninstall clean.

Cheers,
Al+

[Alistair]

Still no log of all coms events generated, or is that particular log not visible in the log viewer? I changed the [mailscanner] log=20 , saved, Stop access protection, then Start access protection right?

Interesting, I have two pop email accounts free.net.nz and orcon.net.nz if I use my default Avast scanner locks spamdel out, but if I use the secondary spamdel works OK. Would be good to see the log to see what is happening.
Alistair+

[lukor]

Alistair, search the forum for Log=20 !!!

the log file is generated in the <avast4>\data\log folder in the file ashMaisv.log, will be accessible only when Internet Mail provider is terminated.

Anyway, I have downloaded your program, filled up the introductory wizard, let it download my messages. It marked 5 of them as spam (well, missed my spams and marked the regular mails, but that does not matter for now), I've chosen one, clicked spamDel/Del, it redownloaded again and the message was deleted. All this was scanned by avast mail scanner...hmm, nothing wrong here.

[Alistair]

Hi again. I can see the error on mailserver Orcon here; you can see mailserver Freenet is OK. I am not sure where the anomaly is, but it appears the UIDL list is not being provided correctly for some reason from Orcon when it parses via Avast.
Will put more time into it in next days when I can.
Alistair+