IBM Support

Could not connect to SMTP SSL host

Troubleshooting


Problem

The SMTP connection test over SSL is not valid with a "Basic Authentication", with a message indicating that the host is unreachable, and when testing email sending, we get a message saying the email is pending to be sent

Symptom

Error message in SMTP interface :
Could not connect to SMTP  host smtp-server-name, port smtp-port

Error message after a simple test with a report  :
CNC-SDS-0408 There are email messages waiting to be sent

 

Diagnosing The Problem

Enable SDS tracing to observe the CONNECTION_TIMEOUT exception :

getTransport : 1 : Called
..
getTransport : 8 : Transport connection not obtained from pool, creating a new connection 
getTransport : 9 : New Transport connection created : smtp://xxxxxx@smtp-server-name:smtp-port
 ...Trace.DLS CNC-SDS-0361 SMTP server defined: [smtp-server-name:smtp-port] Port: [smtp-port] DLS TRACE
....:  MAIL_SMTP_CONNECTION_TIMEOUT:600000 DLS TRACE
... :  MAIL_SMTP_READ_TIMEOUT:600000 DLS TRACE
...:   MAIL_SMTP_WRITE_TIMEOUT:600000 DLS TRACE
....
...
getTransport : 10 : Transport not connected, trying to reconnect
...
getTransport : 13 : MessagingException : javax.mail.AuthenticationFailedException: 500 Line too long 

Resolving The Problem

In Manage > Configuration > System > Advanced add the two parameters below :
mail.smtp.starttls.enable=true
mail.smtp.starttls.required=true

A Cognos restart is needed.

As part of the verification, ensure that emails are not quarantined by the mail server

Document Location

Worldwide

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Document Information

Modified date:
24 March 2026

UID

ibm17267329