# ActionMailer sending mail, but never received

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/actionmailer-sending-mail-but-never-received/140599>\
**Category:** Rails\
**Created:** [June 16, 2008, 6:19pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/actionmailer-sending-mail-but-never-received/140599 "2008-06-16T18:19:46Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 6\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![gregthegerg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/g/a88e57/32.png) [@gregthegerg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/gregthegerg)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2008, 6:19pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/actionmailer-sending-mail-but-never-received/140599/1 "2008-06-16T18:19:46Z")

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Hey, I’m using ActionMailer to send emails, but the recipient never  
receives them.

Here’s the method in my Notifier class:

def order\_placed(order)  
recipients order.user.email  
from “removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid”  
subject “Your Soundcast Systems Order”  
body :order =\> order  
end

And here’s a snip from the log (development):

…snip…  
Address Load (0.002011) SELECT \* FROM `addresses` WHERE  
(`addresses`.addressable\_id = 5 AND `addresses`.addressable\_type =  
‘Order’ AND (addresses.which = ‘shipping’)) LIMIT 1  
Payment Load (0.001367) SELECT \* FROM `payments` WHERE  
(`payments`.order\_id = 5) LIMIT 1  
Payment Columns (0.003850) SHOW FIELDS FROM `payments`  
User Load (0.000760) SELECT \* FROM `users` WHERE (`users`.`id` =  
1)  
Sent mail to removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid

From: removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid  
To: removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid  
Subject: Your Soundcast Systems Order  
Mime-Version: 1.0  
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8

Hi Greg Burger, you placed an order.

This is a test.  
SQL (0.000518) BEGIN  
SQL (0.000189) COMMIT  
…snip…

From that snip of the log, it certainly seems as if the email is being  
sent. I tried to have it sent to a few  
different addresses, and none of them ever actually get the email. (I  
looked in my Junk folders too.)

I saw in a previous thread someone was having a similar problem, but  
they just had an empty “to” field.

Any ideas?

Thanks,  
Greg

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![gregthegerg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/g/a88e57/32.png) [@gregthegerg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/gregthegerg)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2008, 6:22pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/actionmailer-sending-mail-but-never-received/140599/2 "2008-06-16T18:22:43Z")

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On 16 Jun 2008, at 17:18, Greg B. wrote:

> Hey, I’m using ActionMailer to send emails, but the recipient never  
> receives them.

Is actionmailer set to use the correct smtp/sendmail/ etc… ?

Fred

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![gregthegerg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/g/a88e57/32.png) [@gregthegerg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/gregthegerg)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2008, 6:26pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/actionmailer-sending-mail-but-never-received/140599/3 "2008-06-16T18:26:15Z")

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another option is that delivery\_method for actionmailer is set to test  
in  
config/environments/development.rb.

config.action\_mailer.delivery\_method = :test

In that case you would still get your mail content in the log file,  
but nothing is delivered.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![gregthegerg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/g/a88e57/32.png) [@gregthegerg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/gregthegerg)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2008, 6:27pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/actionmailer-sending-mail-but-never-received/140599/4 "2008-06-16T18:27:27Z")

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I set it. I assume the settings are correct as there are no errors in  
the log. Would it insert an error in the log or give me an error page  
if it couldn’t login to the server to send the mail?

Greg

On Jun 16, 12:21 pm, Frederick C. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![gregthegerg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/g/a88e57/32.png) [@gregthegerg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/gregthegerg)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2008, 6:32pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/actionmailer-sending-mail-but-never-received/140599/5 "2008-06-16T18:32:12Z")

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Ah!! Figured it out…

My “from” email has to be an existing email account otherwise the mail  
server was rejecting the address.

When I looked for:  
config.action\_mailer.delivery\_method = :test

I saw:  
config.action\_mailer.raise\_delivery\_errors = false

So I set it to true and this time it threw an error.

Thanks!

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![gregthegerg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/g/a88e57/32.png) [@gregthegerg](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/gregthegerg)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2008, 6:35pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/actionmailer-sending-mail-but-never-received/140599/6 "2008-06-16T18:35:10Z")

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On 16 Jun 2008, at 17:27, Greg B. wrote:

> I set it. I assume the settings are correct as there are no errors in  
> the log. Would it insert an error in the log or give me an error page  
> if it couldn’t login to the server to send the mail?

Depends on the delivery method. For example if you set it to sendmail  
and sendmail accepts the item you won’t get an error message, even if  
sendmail then later on drops it on the floor.

Fred