Email sending failure

PowerShell Universal
1

Hi There!

I have a strange problem.

I am running the latest version of PSU, and among other things I have set up a task to copy items to an SFTP. No problem with the copy parts.

However, when it comes to email sending, it would seem the email sending fails when I am disconnected from the server and not logged in to PSU, this results in error:

image

When I am logged in, this error does not happen, email sending a-OK:

image
image1267×326 19.9 KB

My script - with some reduction - is this:

The script uses GitHub - EvotecIT/Mailozaurr: Mailozaurr is a PowerShell module that aims to provide SMTP, POP3, IMAP and probably some other ways to interact with Email. Underneath it uses MimeKit and MailKit libraries written by Jeffrey Stedfast. -s Send-EmailMessage command, and targets an internal SMTP relay.

Any suggestions what can go wrong?

Thanks,
F.

2

Have you tried using Send-MailMessage instead of that additional module?

3

Hi @Jesse.Peden

During development I was using that, but my manager requested to replace it, following - as you might know: Microsoft itself does not recommend using the good old Send-MailMessage anymore - MS guidelines.

With that being said, I do not necessarily think the issue stems from the command, since Send-EmailMessage works perfectly, when I am running the job from the PSU console (failure only happens on scheduled runs, when my account is not logged in).

1 Like
4

Can you try to get a bit more info about the error location?

} catch {
    Write-Output "Email sending failed. Reason: $($_.Exception.Message)"
    Write-Output $_.Exception.StackTrace
    Continue
}

I’m also not seeing verbose messages. I could just be misreading the log snippet. Try putting this at the top. It looks like Mailzar should be spitting out a bunch of log messages.

$VerbosityPreference = 'Continue'
5

Fair enough. I was just wondering mostly if it was isolated to the module and not PSU.

6

Thanks for the reply.

This is the result of the changes of the catch {} block:

Transcript stopped, the output file is C:\ProgramData\UniversalAutomation\Repository\TASKS\Logs\Oodle-Transcript_01032025-060020-AM.txt
Email sending failed. Reason: Exception calling ".ctor" with "2" argument(s): "Unexpected ',' token at offset 26"
   at System.Management.Automation.ExceptionHandlingOps.CheckActionPreference(FunctionContext funcContext, Exception exception)
   at System.Management.Automation.Interpreter.ActionCallInstruction`2.Run(InterpretedFrame frame)
   at System.Management.Automation.Interpreter.EnterTryCatchFinallyInstruction.Run(InterpretedFrame frame)
   at System.Management.Automation.Interpreter.EnterTryCatchFinallyInstruction.Run(InterpretedFrame frame)
   at System.Management.Automation.Interpreter.Interpreter.Run(InterpretedFrame frame)
   at System.Management.Automation.Interpreter.LightLambda.RunVoid1[T0](T0 arg0)
   at System.Management.Automation.PSScriptCmdlet.RunClause(Action`1 clause, Object dollarUnderbar, Object inputToProcess)
   at System.Management.Automation.PSScriptCmdlet.DoEndProcessing()
   at System.Management.Automation.CommandProcessorBase.Complete()
7

Hmmm. This looks just like the PS exception. Is there an inner exception?

Write-Output "Email sending failed. Reason: $($_.Exception.InnerException.Message)"
    Write-Output $_.Exception.InnerException.StackTrace
    Continue
8

hi @adam

(sorry for the delay, I was off and script runs daily).

With this block

    Write-Output "Email sending failed. Reason: $($_.Exception.InnerException.Message)"
    Write-Output $_.Exception.InnerException.StackTrace
    Continue

I had no output.

image
image1711×699 139 KB

I put back:

    Write-Output "Email sending failed. Reason: $($_.Exception.Message)"
    Write-Output $_.Exception.StackTrace
    Continue

And now I got:

image
image1110×269 11.7 KB

Some background information:

  • the job normally runs before office hours, at 6:00 AM
  • on a Windows server install (service is running as local system)
  • usually, at that time my user account is disconnected, and I am not logged in to PowerShell Universal

image
image1524×510 53.5 KB

When I re-run the job from the UI (no change in parameters whatsoever), there is no problem/error whatsoever, emails are sent as intended

image
image1897×971 65.4 KB

Is there anything I can investigate?

Thanks,
F.

9

I was just looking at your script again. Do you have roles specified on your secret variable?

$SFTPCredential = $secret:SFTPCredentialOODLE_DEV
10

Nope.

image
image817×666 20.3 KB

It is only used to connect to the internal SMTP server anyway…

11

This is weird. I have to imagine some variable that is being passed in is affecting the behavior. Unless you are running under different credentials when scheduled vs manual, the execution context should be the same. That said, the variables passed into the script may be different from the different triggering mechanisms.

You might want to run Get-Variable at the beginning of your script and compare what’s different to see if anything stands out.