Trouble Shooting

The CryptoMail Email System is running smoothly when you are able to send and receive Email from within the same system and outside the other systems. In trouble shooting, we provide some solutions to the most common problems that relate to installation, configuration and operation.

<host_name> - domain name of the hosting server
<html_publish> - HTML publish directory
<cgi_bin> - CGI-BIN directory
<cm_cgi> - the CryptoMail Server CGI

Installation Problems

I installed the CryptoMail Email System, and I can read all the HTML files in the folder from a browser, but I cannot run the CGI!

You may not have permissions to execute CGI in the <html_publish>/cgi-bin or have not setup your web server to run CGI. You will need to check your web server documentation to setup CGI.

I installed all the CryptoMail Server CGI into my web server's CGI-BIN, then I cannot use the Login.html, CreateNewCryptoMailAccount.html or ChangePassphrase.html to run the server!

By default, the HTML will look for the URL at https://<host_name>/cgi-bin/<cm_cgi>. If you place the CryptoMail Email System into URL other than the default, you will need to configure your server to point at it or you will need to modify the NewCryptoMailAccount.html, Login.html and ChangePassphrase.html.

When I run the CryptoMail Client, sometime, the browser says it cannot read BadUserName.html, UserNameExists.html, HokeyUserName.html, LoginFailure.html, InternalError.html, SessionFail.html, Session.html, NewAccount.html or Passphrase.html!

You must place those HTML files in the same directory with the CryptoMail Server CGI, and you must give read permissions to those files inside the CryptoMail CGI-BIN directory. If you already setup correct permissions to the files, but the problems still occur, you might have setup your web server to execute a CGI in a shell different than directory location of the CGI. In this case, you can do two things:

1. Setup your web server to execute a CGI program with the current working directory set as the same directory location of the CGI executable
2. Move all your customized HTML templates to the CGI execution directory.

Configuration Problems

My customized Sign In (Login or Change Passphrase) page for signing in (logging in or changing passphrase) does not work!

You have to make sure that your FORM tag is configured correctly with the action URL (/cgi-bin/<cm_cgi>), form method (POST) and input name (UserName).

If you put your CryptoMail Server CGI in directory different than the default directory (/cgi-bin), you will have different FORM action URL than in the Configure Section. To make the customized pages work on different directories (or URLS), you have to understand the configuration of your web server by reading your web server documentation.

Moreover, the action URL and input name inside the FORM is case sensitive, and you should check for the correctness of the case for them. For example, CryptoMailNewUser.cgi is different than cryptomailnewuser.cgi.

The Email server will not load any of my customized HTML templates for the server generated pages!

You must use the same file name (same case) of all HTML templates, and you must place the pages in the same directory of the CryptoMail Sever CGI. For example, if your CryptoMail.cgi is in /usr/local/apache/cgi-bin, you will need to create /usr/local/apache/cgi-bin/InternalError.html.

I put the HTML templates in the same directory of the CryptoMail Server CGI, but the CryptoMail Server will not load the templates!

Most of the web servers out there are set up to execute a CGI program in a shell with the same directory location of the CGI, but it is possible that this setup does not apply to your web server. In this case, you can do two things:

1. Setup your web server to execute a CGI at the same directory location of the CGI
2. Moves all your customized HTML templates to the CGI execution directory.

I have some troubles making the New Account Applet, Session Applet and Change Passphrase Applet pages work!

Configuring customized Applet pages are an advanced feature of the CryptoMail Email System, and you should read the Client/Server Manual before start. You have to make sure your APPLET tag is present with the correct URL (e.g. /CryptoMail/JAVAClient) and name (e.g. CryptoMailApp) , and you also have to have all the same parameters and replacement tags of the Java Applet as the default HTML templates. In addition, all configuration variables are case sensitive. Most often, the configuration problems relate to customized Applet containing syntax errors.

My customized logout page does not work!

The logout page must place in the <html_publish>/CryptoMail directory, and have the file name Logout.html with correct permissions.

Operation Problems

I have Netscape Communicator or Microsoft Internet Explorer, but I cannot run the CryptoMail Client!

You need Netscape Communicator or Microsoft Internet Explorer versions that meet the system requirements of the CryptoMail Client. Most often, you may have the correct versions of browsers to run the Email client, but you do not have the 128-Bit SSL strength required, or you have changed the configuration of the browser to disallow running of Java Applets.

The CryptoMail Client will not work on my Netscape Communicator!

You should check your preferences settings of your Netscape Communicator. They reside under the menu Edit - Preferences - Category: Advanced. You need to click on the Enable Java and Enable JavaScript boxes to allow the client to run Java and Java Script on your browser.

The CryptoMail Client does not work on my Microsoft Internet Explorer!

You should check your security setting of your Microsoft Internet Explore, under the menu bar Tools - Internet Options - Security - Internet - Security Settings. You need to give permissions to execute Java and enable Java Script of your browser. You may also need to check the SSL settings in Security Settings:Advanced. If you still have problems setting up your browser to run the client, you may want to change your browser settings back to the factory defaults.

After I enter my passphrase for my Email account, why do I have to wait so long for the Email client?

The CryptoMail Client is working fine, though you have waited for long time, normally no longer than 1 min. During the login process, the server is generating a set of random numbers for an encryption keypair which may require some time. Depending on system load and the entropy of the system, the login process should not be taken more than 1 min.