Grokbase › Groups › Python › mailman-users › October 2005
FAQ
Hello,

We have occasions where mailman (2.1.5) seases processing messages sent
to lists - looking in the error log I have this (which I am not entirely sure
is related, but it seems plausable):

** begin log **
Oct 05 08:44:51 2005 (15118) Uncaught runner exception:
unknown encoding: unknown
Oct 05 08:44:51 2005 (15118) Traceback (most recent call last):
File "/usr/local/mailman/Mailman/Queue/Runner.py", line 111, in _oneloop
self._onefile(msg, msgdata)
File "/usr/local/mailman/Mailman/Queue/Runner.py", line 167, in _onefile
keepqueued = self._dispose(mlist, msg, msgdata)
File "/usr/local/mailman/Mailman/Queue/IncomingRunner.py", line 130, in _dispose
more = self._dopipeline(mlist, msg, msgdata, pipeline)
File "/usr/local/mailman/Mailman/Queue/IncomingRunner.py", line 153, in _dopipeline
sys.modules[modname].process(mlist, msg, msgdata)
File "/usr/local/mailman/Mailman/Handlers/CookHeaders.py", line 74, in process
prefix_subject(mlist, msg, msgdata)
File "/usr/local/mailman/Mailman/Handlers/CookHeaders.py", line 262, in prefix_subject
h.append(s, c)
File "/usr/local/mailman/pythonlib/email/Header.py", line 285, in append
s = s.encode(outcodec, errors)
LookupError: unknown encoding: unknown

Oct 05 08:44:51 2005 (15118) SHUNTING: 1128523491.012949+8a483505bad6e02364dde9314038b35222278d06


** end log **


I've found mention of the bug at:
https://sourceforge.net/tracker/?funcÞtail&atid0103&aid—4290&group_id3


and further discussion on the thread at:
http://mail.python.org/pipermail/mailman-developers/2004-December.txt


however I'm in-need of some help further diagnosing whether the above
error log snippet and mailman bug is actually the cause, and how to
resolve the issue. I'm confused as to why the unknown encoding is
"unknown" - can someone shed light on this?


We are looking to upgrade to 2.1.6, but would prefer to do it later in
the year.


Thanks -- Ivan.

Search Discussions

  • Stephen J. Turnbull at Oct 6, 2005 at 8:21 am ⇧
    "Ivan" == Ivan Fetch <ifetch at du.edu> writes:
    Ivan> I'm confused as to why the unknown encoding is "unknown" -
    Ivan> can someone shed light on this?

    Probably because some less-than-conformant agent put that literal
    string in a Content-Type header. Try grepping the spool for
    "charset=unknown" (or just "unknown") and look carefully at the
    message found. I've seen that "charset" in spam messages (at least).

    BTW, from Mailman's (actually, Mailman just passes the buck to Python)
    point of view, it's unknown because there is no codec (character
    encoder/decoder modules) for a charset named "unknown". You'd run
    into the same thing if the charset were, say, "hellspark". I get this
    kind of thing all the time (in a different Python application) because
    Mac OS X defaults to "X-Mac-Japanese" in my locale. :-(


    --
    School of Systems and Information Engineering http://turnbull.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp
    University of Tsukuba Tennodai 1-1-1 Tsukuba 305-8573 JAPAN
    Ask not how you can "do" free software business;
    ask what your business can "do for" free software.
  • Ivan Fetch at Oct 6, 2005 at 5:04 pm ⇧
    Hi Stephen - thanks for replying!


    In your experience, has this stopped Mailman from processing incoming
    messages? After soem further investigation, I've seen these same errors
    take place, yet Mailman continues processing messages. This makes me
    wonder if what ever is affecting qrunner(s) isn't something else...


    Thanks,
    - Ivan.
    On Thu, 6 Oct 2005, Stephen J. Turnbull wrote:

    "Ivan" == Ivan Fetch <ifetch at du.edu> writes:
    Ivan> I'm confused as to why the unknown encoding is "unknown" -
    Ivan> can someone shed light on this?

    Probably because some less-than-conformant agent put that literal
    string in a Content-Type header. Try grepping the spool for
    "charset=unknown" (or just "unknown") and look carefully at the
    message found. I've seen that "charset" in spam messages (at least).

    BTW, from Mailman's (actually, Mailman just passes the buck to Python)
    point of view, it's unknown because there is no codec (character
    encoder/decoder modules) for a charset named "unknown". You'd run
    into the same thing if the charset were, say, "hellspark". I get this
    kind of thing all the time (in a different Python application) because
    Mac OS X defaults to "X-Mac-Japanese" in my locale. :-(


    --
    School of Systems and Information Engineering http://turnbull.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp
    University of Tsukuba Tennodai 1-1-1 Tsukuba 305-8573 JAPAN
    Ask not how you can "do" free software business;
    ask what your business can "do for" free software.
  • Mark Sapiro at Oct 7, 2005 at 4:41 am ⇧

    Ivan Fetch wrote:
    On Thu, 6 Oct 2005, Stephen J. Turnbull wrote:

    "Ivan" == Ivan Fetch <ifetch at du.edu> writes:
    Ivan> I'm confused as to why the unknown encoding is "unknown" -
    Ivan> can someone shed light on this?

    Probably because some less-than-conformant agent put that literal
    string in a Content-Type header. Try grepping the spool for
    "charset=unknown" (or just "unknown") and look carefully at the
    message found. I've seen that "charset" in spam messages (at least).
    Actually, the originally posted error trace shows the error occurring
    in CookHeaders.py in the attempt to add the subject prefix to the
    subject header, so in this case, the 'unknown' character set would not
    have been specified in a Content-Type: header, but rather in an RFC
    2047 encoding of the message subject.

    --
    Mark Sapiro <msapiro at value.net> The highway is for gamblers,
    San Francisco Bay Area, California better use your sense - B. Dylan
  • Stephen J. Turnbull at Oct 7, 2005 at 7:48 am ⇧
    "Ivan" == Ivan Fetch <ifetch at du.edu> writes:
    Ivan> In your experience, has this stopped Mailman from
    Ivan> processing incoming messages? After soem further
    Ivan> investigation, I've seen these same errors take place, yet
    Ivan> Mailman continues processing messages. This makes me wonder
    Ivan> if what ever is affecting qrunner(s) isn't something else...

    In some cases charset errors have stopped Mailman (not my experience,
    but reports on the list). It's been a while, so I don't recall exact
    details and the most recent version (2.1.6) is significantly more
    robust to charset problems.

    However, any error by definition puts Mailman in an unexpected state.
    If you can't directly connect stoppage to those errors, then you'd
    better keep looking for alternatives. I'm not so confident of 2.1.6
    that I'd say upgrading immediately is your best bet (but it could help).

    Sorry I can't be more precise.

    Steve

    --
    School of Systems and Information Engineering http://turnbull.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp
    University of Tsukuba Tennodai 1-1-1 Tsukuba 305-8573 JAPAN
    Ask not how you can "do" free software business;
    ask what your business can "do for" free software.

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