Email notifications don't work but test emails work

Summary

After successfully configuring the Mail Server with the SMTP settings, and successfully sending a test e-mail, e-mail notifications do not work in Confluence and there are no items stuck in the mail queue. Nothing is reported in the logs.

Diagnosis

Diagnostic Steps

1. Enable debugging for your mail package in Confluence

   1. Choose the cog icon, then choose General Configuration under Confluence Administration

   2. Select 'Logging and Profiling' in the 'Administration' section of the left-hand panel.

      1. Note: you need to have System Administrator permissions in order to perform this function.

   3. The 'Logging and Profiling' screen appears, as shown below. Use the following guidelines to change the logging behavior while Confluence is running:

   4. "Add New Entry" — Add the following to the Class/Package Name text box, select DEBUG from the drop-down menu, and select "Add Entry" - com.atlassian.confluence.mail

   5. Click the 'Save' button to save any changes you have made in the 'Existing Levels' section.

2. After enabling debugging, you will see the following in your atlassian-confluence.log

   2015-09-17 21:11:33,788 DEBUG [http-bio-8090-exec-5084] [atlassian.confluence.mail.BotocssMailContentProcessor] process Botocss is about to inject styles in to the email. 2015-09-17 21:11:33,817 DEBUG [http-bio-8090-exec-5084] [atlassian.confluence.mail.BotocssMailContentProcessor] apply Pruning selected styles from the email. 2015-09-17 14:12:00,007 INFO [scheduler_Worker-3] [confluence.mail.template.AbstractMailNotificationQueueItem] send Not sending email because sending is disabled via system property.

Cause

This issue can arise if Confluence has been set to disable e-mail via the below system properties

• atlassian.mail.senddisabled

• atlassian.notifications.disabled

Solution

Remove or comment the atlassian.mail.senddisabled and atlassian.notifications.disabled system property, or adjust the parameter from true to false

Linux

1. From <confluence-install>/bin (Stand-alone) or <Tomcat-home>/bin (EAR-WAR installation), open setenv.sh.

2. Find the section CATALINA_OPTS= (this is JAVA_OPTS= in Confluence 5.5 and earlier)

3. Remove the parameters containing atlassian.mail.senddisabled and atlassian.notifications.disabled

Windows (starting from .bat file)

If you start Confluence from the .bat File:

1. From <confluence-install>/bin (Stand-alone) or <Tomcat-home>/bin (EAR-WAR installation), open setenv.bat.

2. Find the section set CATALINA_OPTS=%CATALINA_OPTS% (this is set JAVA_OPTS=%JAVA_OPTS% in Confluence 5.5 and earlier)

3. Remove the parameter containing: atlassian.mail.senddisabled and atlassian.notifications.disabled, or adjust the entry to false

Windows Service: Setting Properties for Windows Services via Command Line

To set properties for Windows Services via a command line:

1. Identify the name of the service that Confluence is installed as in Windows (Go to Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Services):

   

   In the above example, the service name is Confluence121213135538.

2. Open the command window (Choose Start > cmd.exe)

3. cd to the bin directory of your Confluence instance (or the bin directory of your Tomcat installation if you are running Confluence EAR/WAR).

4. Run the following command: tomcat7w //ES//<SERVICENAME> In this example, the command would be tomcat7w //ES//Confluence121213135538 The Tomcat version number may be different if you are using an earlier version of Confluence.

5. Click on the Java tab to see the list of current start-up options:

   

6. Remove the line containing atlassian.mail.senddisabled and atlassian.notifications.disabled, or adjust the entry to false

   1. The full line may be: -D atlassian.mail.senddisabled=true

Setting Properties for Windows Services via the Windows Registry

In some versions of Windows, there is no option to add Java variables to the service. In these cases, you must add the properties by viewing the option list in the registry.

1. Go to the Registry Editor (Start > regedit.exe).

2. Find the Services entry:

   32-bit: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE >> SOFTWARE >> Apache Software Foundation >> Procrun 2.0 >> Confluence 64-bit: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE >> SOFTWARE >> Wow6432Node >> Apache Software Foundation >> Procrun 2.0 >> Confluence service name

   

3. Delete the registry entry containing atlassian.mail.senddisabled and atlassian.notifications.disabled, or adjust the entry to false