Windows Mail curiosities

....winston‫ wrote:
Neil Gould wrote:


No... the problem is with incoming mail to Outlook.com from a few
services that are only ISP/web host/mail services. Outgoing from the
outlook.com to those accounts works fine, too.

Fyi...Outlook.com can be persnickety if the MSFT account (Outlook.com,
Hotmail.com, Live.com, and MSn.com) online user profile is not fully
configured properly (i.e. missing time zone data) for the location of
the registered MSFT account.
- https://account.live.com

Thanks, but all MSFT account information is configured.
--
best regards,

Neil

"...winston?" has brought this to us :
none wrote:
"...winston?" explained :

It's still doubtful that any recent use or knowledge of the
Outlook.com filter is present thus any statement about it's
effectiveness (notoriously bad) is hardly worthy of belief or value to
anyone in this group.

I have dealt with Outlook.com extensively as well, in fact we used to
use them to host a couple of email domains for businesses. They
absolutely suck when it comes to spam detection and email validation. It
was so bad we abandoned them and migrated to other services which work
FAR better.


Same question as requested earlier to another poser of Outlook.com spam
filter knowledge --.when was the last time you dealt with Outlook.com?

Any response though from your troll based approach of doling out information
with circumstantial and idiotic accusations falls in the same category as
claiming to have dealt with Outlook.com domains - untruths without
substantiation.

Winston, you obviously have no understanding of anything beyond
consumer level apps, if that. If anyone is a "poser" in the discussion
of mail server operations, it is you. Do you get so defensive of
Microsoft because you own their stock or is it the Vodka?

We abandoned the last of three Outlook.com domain hosting accounts 29
December 2014 because of inconsistent mail delivery issues that have
tormented us for years. Outlook.com regularly bounced legitimate
correspondence coming directly from business contacts, including but
not limited to, IBM.com, Nasa.gov & Oracle.com. There is something very
wrong with the way the mail servers are administered by Microsoft. No
matter how many times we contacted them, the problems were never
addressed.

Since we have been hosting our domain mail with Google Apps, we have
not had a single issue.

Best Regards,
Robert

On 3/10/2015 9:13 AM, none wrote:

We abandoned the last of three Outlook.com domain hosting accounts 29
December 2014 because of inconsistent mail delivery issues that have
tormented us for years. Outlook.com regularly bounced legitimate
correspondence coming directly from business contacts, including but not
limited to, IBM.com, Nasa.gov & Oracle.com. There is something very
wrong with the way the mail servers are administered by Microsoft. No
matter how many times we contacted them, the problems were never addressed.

This is the kind of thing that I'm hearing the more I look into this
problem. It should be clear to Microsoft that it is unacceptable to
reject mail at random, even from those in the Contacts list!

Since we have been hosting our domain mail with Google Apps, we have not
had a single issue.

This may turn out to be the kind of solution we'll have to undertake, as
well.
--
best regards,

Neil

On 3/9/2015 8:33 PM, "...winston‫" wrote:
Neil Gould wrote:
...winston‫ wrote:

It's still doubtful that any recent use or knowledge of the
Outlook.com filter is present thus any statement about it's
effectiveness (notoriously bad) is hardly worthy of belief or value
to anyone in this group.

Trying to bring this back on-topic, just in case there's something that I
might be able to do that will fix my problem...

I'll admit to having very little experience with outlook.com, and would
appreciate any insights about its use. What I see as options in the
outlook.com settings is the equivalent of a "whitelist" where one can
enter
the email addresses, and supposedly the URL of considered "safe". The
problem is that it doesn't work. Most mail from "safe" accounts still
gets
bounced by outlook.com with the same error as before.

One anomaly that I've noted is that when setting up the Windows
account, I
entered an alternate email address instead of a phone number. Mail
from that
address is the one that is intermittent, mail sent from it is sometimes
bounced, sometimes not, even though that address is also in the "safe"
list.

Is there something in those settings that I'm overlooking?

Add the sender to you contacts list and remove it from the Safe Senders.

The sender with the intermittent rejections is in the contacts list.

Can you explain the purpose of Safe Senders, if not to allow the receipt
of email?

The protective spam filtering is most likely seeing the content in the
email as suspicious.

It doesn't appear to matter what the content is.

By adding the address to your contacts will provide
the option in the received message to 'Ok' future emails from the sender
for similar 'in-message' content.

If the email is being rejected out of hand, one can't add those unknown
senders to the contacts list. Beyond that, the content in messages is
likely to vary in normal use. Why should a robot be involved in making
such decisions?
--
best regards,

Neil

On 3/10/2015 10:46 AM, Stormin' Norman wrote:
On Tue, 10 Mar 2015 09:56:27 -0400, Neil wrote:


If the email is being rejected out of hand, one can't add those unknown
senders to the contacts list. Beyond that, the content in messages is
likely to vary in normal use. Why should a robot be involved in making
such decisions?

Here is a pretty decent article about why emails bounce and how to diagnose the
issues. As Microsoft administered email systems are at best inconsistent, I
would not assume everything in the article applies to Outlook.com.

https://luxsci.com/blog/wheres-the-e...-messages.html

Thanks... most of that is pretty general, but it may help other readers
understand some aspects of emailing.
--
best regards,

Neil

Neil wrote:
On 3/9/2015 8:33 PM, "...winston‫" wrote:
Neil Gould wrote:
...winston‫ wrote:

It's still doubtful that any recent use or knowledge of the
Outlook.com filter is present thus any statement about it's
effectiveness (notoriously bad) is hardly worthy of belief or value
to anyone in this group.

Trying to bring this back on-topic, just in case there's something
that I
might be able to do that will fix my problem...

I'll admit to having very little experience with outlook.com, and would
appreciate any insights about its use. What I see as options in the
outlook.com settings is the equivalent of a "whitelist" where one can
enter
the email addresses, and supposedly the URL of considered "safe". The
problem is that it doesn't work. Most mail from "safe" accounts still
gets
bounced by outlook.com with the same error as before.

One anomaly that I've noted is that when setting up the Windows
account, I
entered an alternate email address instead of a phone number. Mail
from that
address is the one that is intermittent, mail sent from it is sometimes
bounced, sometimes not, even though that address is also in the "safe"
list.

Is there something in those settings that I'm overlooking?

Add the sender to you contacts list and remove it from the Safe Senders.

The sender with the intermittent rejections is in the contacts list.

Can you explain the purpose of Safe Senders, if not to allow the receipt
of email?

The protective spam filtering is most likely seeing the content in the
email as suspicious.

It doesn't appear to matter what the content is.

By adding the address to your contacts will provide
the option in the received message to 'Ok' future emails from the sender
for similar 'in-message' content.

If the email is being rejected out of hand, one can't add those unknown
senders to the contacts list. Beyond that, the content in messages is
likely to vary in normal use. Why should a robot be involved in making
such decisions?

Do you not know the source email address of those messages ?
i.e. the email addresses can be added manually.

Content can appear to contain text and links that the filters flag as
suspicious.

Why a bot making a decision about content ?....the answer is quite
simple - Outlook.com and everything stored on is stored on MSFT
property. Doesn't matter if it's yours, mine, or a compromised hacked
account that may be used to send suspicious material (content or
links)....they all get 'botted'

Folks around here will tout the weaknesses of Outlook.com
filtering...I've Gmail, Yahoo, and other third party email accounts
being pulled into Outlook.com accounts and Outlook.com continues to
filter spam that all those accounts online filters missed and delivered
to the respective accounts Inbox.



--
....winston
msft mvp consumer apps

"...winston?" used his keyboard to write :
Neil wrote:
On 3/9/2015 8:33 PM, "...winston‫" wrote:
Neil Gould wrote:
...winston‫ wrote:

It's still doubtful that any recent use or knowledge of the
Outlook.com filter is present thus any statement about it's
effectiveness (notoriously bad) is hardly worthy of belief or value
to anyone in this group.

Trying to bring this back on-topic, just in case there's something
that I
might be able to do that will fix my problem...

I'll admit to having very little experience with outlook.com, and would
appreciate any insights about its use. What I see as options in the
outlook.com settings is the equivalent of a "whitelist" where one can
enter
the email addresses, and supposedly the URL of considered "safe". The
problem is that it doesn't work. Most mail from "safe" accounts still
gets
bounced by outlook.com with the same error as before.

One anomaly that I've noted is that when setting up the Windows
account, I
entered an alternate email address instead of a phone number. Mail
from that
address is the one that is intermittent, mail sent from it is sometimes
bounced, sometimes not, even though that address is also in the "safe"
list.

Is there something in those settings that I'm overlooking?

Add the sender to you contacts list and remove it from the Safe Senders.

The sender with the intermittent rejections is in the contacts list.

Can you explain the purpose of Safe Senders, if not to allow the receipt
of email?

The protective spam filtering is most likely seeing the content in the
email as suspicious.

It doesn't appear to matter what the content is.

By adding the address to your contacts will provide
the option in the received message to 'Ok' future emails from the sender
for similar 'in-message' content.

If the email is being rejected out of hand, one can't add those unknown
senders to the contacts list. Beyond that, the content in messages is
likely to vary in normal use. Why should a robot be involved in making
such decisions?

Do you not know the source email address of those messages ?
i.e. the email addresses can be added manually.

Content can appear to contain text and links that the filters flag as
suspicious.

Why a bot making a decision about content ?....the answer is quite simple -
Outlook.com and everything stored on is stored on MSFT property. Doesn't
matter if it's yours, mine, or a compromised hacked account that may be used
to send suspicious material (content or links)....they all get 'botted'

Folks around here will tout the weaknesses of Outlook.com filtering...I've
Gmail, Yahoo, and other third party email accounts being pulled into
Outlook.com accounts and Outlook.com continues to filter spam that all those
accounts online filters missed and delivered to the respective accounts
Inbox.

Very impressive example of Microsoft syncophantic drivel and
double-talk! You obviously have zero understanding of mail servers /
systems. You should stick to supporting Notepad and Wordpad.......

Best regards,
Robert

....winston‫ wrote:
Neil wrote:
On 3/9/2015 8:33 PM, "...winston‫" wrote:
Neil Gould wrote:
...winston‫ wrote:

It's still doubtful that any recent use or knowledge of the
Outlook.com filter is present thus any statement about it's
effectiveness (notoriously bad) is hardly worthy of belief or
value to anyone in this group.

Trying to bring this back on-topic, just in case there's something
that I
might be able to do that will fix my problem...

I'll admit to having very little experience with outlook.com, and
would appreciate any insights about its use. What I see as options
in the outlook.com settings is the equivalent of a "whitelist"
where one can enter
the email addresses, and supposedly the URL of considered "safe".
The problem is that it doesn't work. Most mail from "safe"
accounts still gets
bounced by outlook.com with the same error as before.

One anomaly that I've noted is that when setting up the Windows
account, I
entered an alternate email address instead of a phone number. Mail
from that
address is the one that is intermittent, mail sent from it is
sometimes bounced, sometimes not, even though that address is also
in the "safe" list.

Is there something in those settings that I'm overlooking?

Add the sender to you contacts list and remove it from the Safe
Senders.

The sender with the intermittent rejections is in the contacts list.

Can you explain the purpose of Safe Senders, if not to allow the
receipt of email?

The protective spam filtering is most likely seeing the content
in the email as suspicious.

It doesn't appear to matter what the content is.

By adding the address to your contacts will provide
the option in the received message to 'Ok' future emails from the
sender for similar 'in-message' content.

If the email is being rejected out of hand, one can't add those
unknown senders to the contacts list. Beyond that, the content in
messages is likely to vary in normal use. Why should a robot be
involved in making such decisions?

Do you not know the source email address of those messages ?
i.e. the email addresses can be added manually.

One cannot know the email addresses of those they have yet to receive email
from. Let the mail in, then decide its status.

Content can appear to contain text and links that the filters flag as
suspicious.

In this case, there are no links at all, nor is any of the text "suspicious"
to any reasonable evaluator. I can think of many situations where
"suspicious" text may be legitimately exchanged, but I'm focussing on the
simplest cases where outlook.com is failing for no good reason.

Why a bot making a decision about content ?....the answer is quite
simple - Outlook.com and everything stored on is stored on MSFT
property. Doesn't matter if it's yours, mine, or a compromised hacked
account that may be used to send suspicious material (content or
links)....they all get 'botted'

Understood. But, then, a smarter bot should be employed.

I'd still like to know the purpose of "Safe Senders", btw, since the bot
apparently disregards its content.
--
best regards,

Neil

none wrote:
- nothing of value


What's apparent is you've no purpose but to troll and dish out garbage..



--
....winston
msft mvp consumer apps

Neil Gould wrote:
...winston‫ wrote:


Do you not know the source email address of those messages ?
i.e. the email addresses can be added manually.

One cannot know the email addresses of those they have yet to receive email
from. Let the mail in, then decide its status.

Earlier you stated:
"Mail from one non-outlook.com account is consistently rejected by
outlook.com, i.e. it is bounced back to the sender. Mail from another
non-outlook.com account is accepted at times and rejected at other
times, with no clear pattern. The only consistent
result I have so far is mail from one outlook.com account to another."

This seemed to state that the 'mail from' email address(es)was known.

Content can appear to contain text and links that the filters flag as
suspicious.

In this case, there are no links at all, nor is any of the text "suspicious"
to any reasonable evaluator. I can think of many situations where
"suspicious" text may be legitimately exchanged, but I'm focussing on the
simplest cases where outlook.com is failing for no good reason.

lol...the only evaluator is MSFT filters reasonable or otherwise.

Why a bot making a decision about content ?....the answer is quite
simple - Outlook.com and everything stored on is stored on MSFT
property. Doesn't matter if it's yours, mine, or a compromised hacked
account that may be used to send suspicious material (content or
links)....they all get 'botted'

Understood. But, then, a smarter bot should be employed.

Smarter is always better but MSFT from day one (purchased Hotmail) has
consistently been tight-lipped (no public disclosure and possibly
rightfully so) on any discussion on the web UI filtering, safe, and
blocked sender parameters.

I'd still like to know the purpose of "Safe Senders", btw, since the bot
apparently disregards its content.

Safe Senders works for me in the web UI though I do restrict its use for
specific accounts and purposes (newsletters, social media
notifications). Fyi...a discussion in Redmond a few years ago centered
on advice/recommendation to never duplicate Safe Sender email address
with Contacts...and if considering doing so refrain and add the address
to the online Contacts.

Safe Senders for an Outlook.com type account (MSn, Hotmail, Live,
Outlook.com) also integrates and syncs down to desktop clients (WLM and
Outlook).

Safe Senders is solely for prevention of filtering incoming messages to
the web UI's (or integrated and syncable DeltaSync or EAS capable local
email client) Junk Mail folder. It has no other applicability. The Spam
and Phishing filters will override the Safe listed addresses and/or
domains if the message body contains suspicious content or links.
- i.e.don't attempt to use it for something that it can't do

--
....winston
msft mvp consumer apps

"...winston?" used his keyboard to write :
none wrote:
- nothing of value


What's apparent is you've no purpose but to troll and dish out garbage..

Doesn't change the fact you have absolutely no understanding of email
systems beyond Outlook Express or Seamonkey.

Stick to helping people with Notepad and do it before you start
drinking for the night.

none wrote:
"...winston?" used his keyboard to write :
none wrote:
- nothing of value


What's apparent is you've no purpose but to troll and dish out garbage..

Doesn't change the fact you have absolutely no understanding of email
systems beyond Outlook Express or Seamonkey.

Third or fourth nym, eh. Having trouble on choosing the next nym ?
- Easy to spot...same isp, same ip, same time zone, same mo.

Gotcha!

--
....winston
msft mvp consumer apps

Neil Gould wrote:

If Safe Senders works as you've described above, it's a horrible design
concept, and should probably just be eliminated to avoid giving users the
impression that it works like a whitelist.

it works exactly as I described it and has been the same well before it
was re-branded Outlook.com (i.e. when known as Hotmail after MSFT took
ownership, MSN Hotmail, and Windows Live Hotmail ).


Microsoft appears to be quite clear that is for prevention of delivery
to the Junk Mail folder.
- Did you not see the explanation when accessing the option in the web
UI ?
It specifically notes the following and exact same statement at least
twice:
qp
Safe and blocked senders
Messages from safe senders will not be sent to the junk email folder.
/qp
and
qp
Safe senders
Messages from safe senders will not be sent to the junk email folder.
/qp

Doesn't appear to be any mention of 'whitelist' implying or giving the
impression that Safe Senders does anything beyond prevention of
filtering an address and/or a domain to the Junk Mail folder.

--
....winston
msft mvp consumer apps

....winston‫ wrote:
Neil Gould wrote:
...winston‫ wrote:


Do you not know the source email address of those messages ?
i.e. the email addresses can be added manually.

One cannot know the email addresses of those they have yet to
receive email from. Let the mail in, then decide its status.

Earlier you stated:
"Mail from one non-outlook.com account is consistently rejected by
outlook.com, i.e. it is bounced back to the sender. Mail from another
non-outlook.com account is accepted at times and rejected at other
times, with no clear pattern. The only consistent
result I have so far is mail from one outlook.com account to another."

This seemed to state that the 'mail from' email address(es)was known.

The thing is, these two comments are completely unrelated. The above comment
from a much earlier post described the nature of the problem that I was
experiencing. My comment that you quoted without context was in response to
your suggestion that email addresses be added to contacts. The full context
follows:

On 3/10/2015 ...winston wrote:
By adding the address to your contacts will provide
the option in the received message to 'Ok' future emails from the
sender for similar 'in-message' content.

If the email is being rejected out of hand, one can't add those
unknown senders to the contacts list. Beyond that, the content in
messages is likely to vary in normal use. Why should a robot be
involved in making such decisions?

Do you not know the source email address of those messages ?
i.e. the email addresses can be added manually.
?
One cannot know the email addresses of those they have yet to receive
email
from. Let the mail in, then decide its status.

[...]

I'd still like to know the purpose of "Safe Senders", btw, since the
bot apparently disregards its content.

Safe Senders works for me in the web UI though I do restrict its use
for specific accounts and purposes (newsletters, social media
notifications). Fyi...a discussion in Redmond a few years ago
centered on advice/recommendation to never duplicate Safe Sender
email address with Contacts...and if considering doing so refrain and
add the address to the online Contacts.

Safe Senders for an Outlook.com type account (MSn, Hotmail, Live,
Outlook.com) also integrates and syncs down to desktop clients (WLM
and Outlook).

Safe Senders is solely for prevention of filtering incoming messages
to the web UI's (or integrated and syncable DeltaSync or EAS capable
local email client) Junk Mail folder. It has no other applicability.
The Spam and Phishing filters will override the Safe listed addresses
and/or domains if the message body contains suspicious content or
links. - i.e.don't attempt to use it for something that it can't do

If Safe Senders works as you've described above, it's a horrible design
concept, and should probably just be eliminated to avoid giving users the
impression that it works like a whitelist.
--
best regards,

Neil

"...winston?" pretended :
none wrote:
"...winston?" used his keyboard to write :
none wrote:
- nothing of value


What's apparent is you've no purpose but to troll and dish out garbage..

Doesn't change the fact you have absolutely no understanding of email
systems beyond Outlook Express or Seamonkey.

Third or fourth nym, eh. Having trouble on choosing the next nym ?
- Easy to spot...same isp, same ip, same time zone, same mo.

Gotcha!

You must still be hungover or drunk. You really are a moron.