Monitor Email queue

[Epiphany]

How can I configure an event so when the number of emails in the queue exceeds a certain number then I am notified on the Mobile Plesk Server Monitor?

Thanks,
Mark

 

[IgorG]

This article may be useful for writing script for event manager - http://kb.parallels.com/en/158

 

[Epiphany]

Thank you for the suggestion but that does not provide a solution. Manually writing the query for number of emails is only part of the answer.

 

[HMoellendorf87]

Hi Epiphany,

why do you want to monitor the queue? Do you have huge consumption in it? Then you should try to reduce it, better than monitoring the queue.

 

[Epiphany]

I have on average < 100 emails in the queue. If a spammer gets into the server then the number of emails in the queue is over 5,000. I want to be notified if the number of emails is > a specified limit.

 

[HMoellendorf87]

Hi Epiphany,

that will be a little bit more complicated. If you mean a spammer as a customer, that it'll hard to discover. But if you mean some ppl, which hacked your server or open relay, I'd say, that you install fail2ban on it.

 

[MislavO]

I don't know how to get notified on the Mobile Plesk Server Monitor, but I've created a simple script on our server that checks email queue, if number exceed XX number, I get email about the same.

Please note that you will get email only if email queue exceed XX number, otherwise you won't get spammed.

Here it is:
- simply create new .sh file, for example in your home folder

# nano /home/user/check_email_queue.sh

Content of file "check_email_queue.sh" is:

#!/bin/bash

# get server hostname
hostname=`cat /etc/hostname`

current_mailq=`postqueue -p | tail -n 1 | cut -d' ' -f5`

yourEmail="YOUR_EMAIL_HERE"


if [ "$current_mailq" -gt "100" ]
then
echo "Mail queue problem - there is currently $current_mailq mails in queue. Please check it out." > check_email_queue_outgoing.txt
mail -s "$hostname - mail queue alert - there are $current_mailq emails in queue" "$yourEmail" < check_email_queue_outgoing.txt
else
echo "Mail queue is fine - there is currently $current_mailq mails in queue. Please check it out."
echo "Do nothing, situation is fine."
fi

- check and change BOLD number that will suit your needs (if queue mail number is bigger then this number, you get email)
- set 744 permission to that file and schedule it as a cronjob:

*/5 * * * * cd /home/user/ && ./check_email_queue.sh

If you have currently e.g. 10 emails in queue, set the number to 5 and run the script - check if you get the email.

Good luck.

 

[Epiphany]

Thank you MislavO. That is the solution to my problem. Good job.