Pickup Delivers Files, but They Stay in the Retry Queue

• Microsoft Commercial Internet System, version 1.0

SYMPTOMS

Erroneous .rtr file(s) may exist in the Queue directory.

Eventually all files will be delivered, but the retry queue will still have some entries left, which SMTP Service attempts to pick up. Because the files have already been deleted, there are no physical files in the Pickup directory corresponding to those entries in the .rtr file. As a result, the processing of the files keeps failing and keeps retrying.

CAUSE

This problem can only occur in a very small window of time, where once the message is deleted (because another thread has delivered it), the service deletes the queue object and does not spin. If the message is opened by the second thread while the first thread is between the CloseHandle and the DeleteFile calls, it may be possible to get to copies of the message.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in Microsoft Commercial Internet System (MCIS) version 1.0. We are researching this problem and will post new information here in the Microsoft Knowledge Base as it becomes available.