Unable to configure email notification settings. Error: "Saving email notification settings failed: The mail test connection attempt failed. Check the connection settings and try again."

Products

• VMware Usage Meter

Issue/Introduction

When configuring SMTP email notifications on Usage Meter 4.8, we get the following error even when "Enable TLS/SSL" check-box is not checked:

"Saving email notification settings failed: The mail test connection attempt failed. Check the connection settings and try again."

 

Environment

You will see the similar log entries in vmware-um-journal.service.log:

photon-machine start-journal-service.sh[1159]: YYYY-MM-DDTHH:MM:SS Z ERROR 1159 --- [0.1-8051-exec-1] .s.n.v.MailNotificationSettingsValidator : Testing mail notifications fail. Used SMTP settings: SmtpSettings{smtpHost='<IP-Address>', smtpPort=25, smtpUser='null', smtpUseSsl=false}.
photon-machine start-journal-service.sh[1159]: jakarta.mail.MessagingException: Could not convert socket to TLS
photon-machine start-journal-service.sh[1159]:         at com.sun.mail.smtp.SMTPTransport.startTLS(SMTPTransport.java:2189)

Cause

The SMTP server that is being used supports STARTTLS command. Thus, UM is trying to upgrade the connection to TLS.

Resolution

To resolve this issue, you have to import the certificate into UM truststore. Here are the steps for the same:
1. The certificate being used can be viewed by executing : openssl s_client -connect <smtp.server>:<port> -starttls smtp 
    (Note: StartTLS is an extension that instructs to upgrade existing non-SSL connection to secure one. It is not the same as 'Use TLS/SSL' on the UI)
2. You can import the certificate by following these steps.