Email Notification Troubleshooting

Following are some possible problems and solutions related to email notification of LifeKeeper events. For specific error messages, see the LifeKeeper Message Catalog.

Problem: No email messages are received from LifeKeeper.

Solution: Verify that the mail utility is installed on the system (it is usually located in /bin/mail). If it is not installed, install the mailx or s-nail package. If it is installed in some other location, edit the PATH variable in the file /etc/default/LifeKeeper and add the path to the mail utility.

Problem: No email messages are received from LifeKeeper.

Solution: Check the email configuration and ensure email messages have not be queued for delivery indicating a possible email configuration problem. Also ensure that the email address or addresses specified in LK_NOTIFY_ALIAS are valid and are separated by a comma.

Problem: The log file has a “mail returned” error message.

Solution: There was some problem invoking or sending mail for a LifeKeeper event, such as a “node failure”, as the mail command return the error X. Verify the mail configuration and that LK_NOTIFY_ALIAS contains a valid email address or list of addresses separated by a comma and ensure that email can be sent to those addresses by sending email from the command line using the email recipient format defined in LK_NOTIFY_ALIAS.

Problem: No messages, success or failure, are logged and the user or users designated to receive email have not received any mail when a LifeKeeper Event has occurred, such as a node failure.

Solution: Check to see if LK_NOTIFY_ALIAS is, in fact, set to an email address or list of addresses separated by commas. From the command line, use the lk_confignotifyalias utility with the “—query” option to verify the setting (See the lk_confignotifyalias(1M) man page for an example.) Or, search for the entry LK_NOTIFY_ALIAS in the file /etc/default/LifeKeeper. This variable must be set on each LifeKeeper node that will generate email notification messages. Also, see the Overview of LifeKeeper Event Email Notification to see if the LifeKeeper event generates an email message (not all events generate email messages).