[copperbeech]

FWIW I am experiencing similarly with my two gmail accounts on my 1 week old Q10 with the latest 10.2 OS. (My Microsoft Exchange account is doing just fine). This is such a problem for me and productivity (my Torch was rock solid in this respect for the exact same wifi networks).

(Is the only way to check if an acount is "connected" is by going into System Settings and selecting ACCOUNTS?)

[Marko M1]

FWIW I am experiencing similarly with my two gmail accounts on my 1 week old Q10 with the latest 10.2 OS. (My Microsoft Exchange account is doing just fine). This is such a problem for me and productivity (my Torch was rock solid in this respect).

(Is the only way to check if an acount is "connected" is by going into System Settings and selecting ACCOUNTS?)

Yes, that is the only way to check status of your accounts. Or you can "notice" if your mails are not comming/going.

[Omnitech]

Yes, that is the only way to check status of your accounts. Or you can "notice" if your mails are not comming/going.

With recent versions of the OS, disconnected accounts show a yellow triangle with an exclamation point, and when a polling cycle fails on one or more accounts it also sends a notification to the notifications category of the Hub.

[Marko M1]

With recent versions of the OS, disconnected accounts show a yellow triangle with an exclamation point, and when a polling cycle fails on one or more accounts it also sends a notification to the notifications category of the Hub.

Yes, it is true, but only if there is some error in connecting. If account is simply "Not Connected" you won't get any notifications.

[Omnitech]

Yes, it is true, but only if there is some error in connecting. If account is simply "Not Connected" you won't get any notifications.

I'm not sure what distinction you are drawing there and under what conditions you feel that it occurs.

In my experience, whenever an account is not being updated, I see the yellow triangle, and when the first failure occurs, I get a notification.

Whereas in the past, with 10.0.9.xxxx, it would just silently fail and could sit there for days without updating and I would never know unless I went all the way into the account editing page and saw that it was not connected.

[Harry_III_UK]

Yes, it is true, but only if there is some error in connecting. If account is simply "Not Connected" you won't get any notifications.

I agree, but I have only seen the "Not Connected" error message with Gmail - I have never seen the yellow triangle.

That was the same under o/s versions 10.1 and 10.2.0.429

The more I think about this, the more I am convinced it is a Gmail problem and not a BlackBerry problem.

Omnitech said:
"Desktop software doesn't have anywhere near the kind of unreliable and constantly changing internet connectivity issues that mobile devices have."

I agree - good point.

Yet my Gmail shows connection errors under both the Outlook desktop client AND the Q10.

So, if Gmail can't stay connected under a far more reliable desktop client - there is little wonder it struggles to remain connected in the mobile environment, handing off from cell towers, jumping to different wi-fi networks etc.

I just think whatever connection protocols Gmail's iteration of IMAP is using are not working well outside of Google's own software. Hence, my Gmail exhibits perfect connection when I'm logged onto Gmail on the web. Yes, logged on the server there is nothing to go wrong. It is not really connecting to anything except over the web http link that it was designed to.

I imagine the Nexus line of phones exhibit perfect connection to Gmail as they are designed to work very well with Google's own e-mail system.

As I have said, friends with iPhones also complain of Gmail dropping connections - so unlikely there is the same "bug" in iOS7 as there is in BB10 (I would think).

Hence my conclusion - it's not me, it's Gmail...

It is still VERY frustrating though!

[copperbeech]

Hence my conclusion - it's not me, it's Gmail...

It is still VERY frustrating though!

For sure. I have had my Q10 for a couple of weeks now with 3 Gmail accounts and one Microsoft Exchange. The 3 gmail consisitently show "not connected" on my work's wifi but not this is never an issue with the Exchange account. And with the home wifi is no problem for any of these email accounts.

[Omnitech]

Yet my Gmail shows connection errors under both the Outlook desktop client AND the Q10.

So, if Gmail can't stay connected under a far more reliable desktop client - there is little wonder it struggles to remain connected in the mobile environment, handing off from cell towers, jumping to different wi-fi networks etc.

You realize that Microsoft Outlook has a reputation for not exactly the greatest IMAP implementation, right?

You should try something like Thunderbird before jumping to that conclusion. What version of Outlook?

[Harry_III_UK]

You realize that Microsoft Outlook has a reputation for not exactly the greatest IMAP implementation, right?

No, I didn't know that.

You should try something like Thunderbird before jumping to that conclusion. What version of Outlook?

Running Outlook 2011 for Mac version 14.3.8 - screenshot:



Does that help?

[Omnitech]

Running Outlook 2011 for Mac version 14.3.8 - screenshot:

Does that help?

Sure, though I don't have much specific knowledge about the Mac version of Outlook. I know there are some significant differences with the PC version, some functionality missing.

Google DOES have a habit of modifying "standard protocols" in proprietary ways, so there are definitely various idiosyncracies with their implementation of things like IMAP. Connection reliability in a generic sense shouldn't be impacted by that, with a couple of caveats.

Google (and also other providers such as Yahoo) is persnickety about anything that remotely looks like a "questionable" connection. So if your device changes IP addresses frequently, for example, it will tend to kill off the session as a preemptive measure designed to cut down on malicious session-hijacking. (Though in most cases that won't affect typical home broadband connections)

On the other hand, probably the single biggest contributor to flaky home broadband links these days are crappy local wireless links. WiFi spectrum is often highly congested, and home networks often are poorly configured, running on lousy equipment, or running beyond the capability of the equipment (ie trying to maintain a connection on your laptop 2 stories below the WiFi router/hotspot), all of those things can contribute to lousy connection reliability.

The reason that is more of an issue with IMAP at times is that the IMAP "push" email facility relies on an aspect of TCP/IP that will fail if the connection reliability is poor. Each folder that is synchronized to a remote endpoint using the IMAP "push" feature (technically known as "IMAP IDLE") requires a long-term persistent "socket" to remain open in order to notify the endpoint of folder changes. (ie new messages)

If the connection is flaky, that socket will close and at the very least it will mean that you won't see timely mailbox-state-change notifications. (IMAP will fall back to the configured polling interval to notify of mailbox changes) In some cases it might cause the endpoint to report the connection is "disconnected" but that depends on how the endpoint works. (BB10 is not exactly the most robust in that respect, in my experience)

Even without using wireless, you may see issues with IMAP IDLE in home networks because the equipment often can't support long-term persistent open TCP sockets regardless of the connection type.

[Harry_III_UK]

Thanks VERY much for that Omnitech - very interesting and informative.

Sure, though I don't have much specific knowledge about the Mac version of Outlook. I know there are some significant differences with the PC version, some functionality missing.

You're absolutely correct, the Mac version of Outlook desktop client is lacking quite a lot of the functionality of the Windows version. For example there is no option in the Mac version to request a delivery or a read receipt for e-mails.

Google (and also other providers such as Yahoo) is persnickety about anything that remotely looks like a "questionable" connection. So if your device changes IP addresses frequently, for example, it will tend to kill off the session as a preemptive measure designed to cut down on malicious session-hijacking. (Though in most cases that won't affect typical home broadband connections)

I can see that would make sense from a security standpoint.

On the other hand, probably the single biggest contributor to flaky home broadband links these days are crappy local wireless links. WiFi spectrum is often highly congested, and home networks often are poorly configured, running on lousy equipment, or running beyond the capability of the equipment (ie trying to maintain a connection on your laptop 2 stories below the WiFi router/hotspot), all of those things can contribute to lousy connection reliability.

Yes, I agree. I like the feature on some of the newer Draytek routers where you can see traffic on the WiFi spectrum and choose a less congested channel.

I've also seen people reporting problems when trying to use their equipment beyond the capabilities of its WiFi range.

As I understand it:

IMAP IDLE is limited to watching 1 IMAP folder per connection.

So, if a user has 5 folders they want to watch, they need 5 IMAP IDLE connections.

So, if a user has 5 e-mail accounts each with 5 folders in, they need 5 accounts x 5 folders = 25 IMAP IDLE connections.

If IMAP NOTIFY was used instead of IMAP IDLE, then it would be possible to monitor multiple folders per connection.

Now, if that is correct - is it possible that users are ending up with multiple IMAP IDLE connections to the same folder?

When the Q10 hands off from WiFi to cellular, or changes its IP address, does it have to close all IMAP IDLE connections under WiFi and re-open them under cellular?

Or can IMAP IDLE use the existing connections after handover and not need to close the existing connections?

I would think it has to close the existing connections and then reestablish them as "new" connections.

If so, then does it also have to close all existing connections when it switches cell towers - as presumably each cell tower has a different IP address?

If it should close the connections and establish new ones then is it possible that not all connections are being closed properly?

If so, then is it possible that during the drive home, going through many cell tower hand overs that multiple connections are being left open in error? Perhaps a RESET packet is not being sent, or is not being handled correctly?

If Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) is being used for the connection then is there additional overhead in the handshake part of the SSL connection protocol to establish that secure connection? Perhaps the cell tower's bandwidth can't handle all of the SSL handshake overhead correctly for "that many" connections?

Is it also possible that the Gmail IMAP server has some sort of "upper limit" on the amount of IMAP IDLE connections it will allow at any one time? If this limit is exceeded due to multiple connections being open, then does it disconnect the Q10?

Or does Gmail not allow the Q10 to establish more connections than Gmail's upper limit? So, if the Q10 has reached the Gmail upper limit with redundant "should have been closed" connections that won't work for sending and receiving e-mail, is the Q10 effectively clogging itself up?

If so, that would that explain why users often report that a re-boot of the Q10 fixes the Gmail "not connected" issue. All connections are closed on shutdown and fresh ones are opened on startup of the device, thus clearing the "junk connections" from the device.

Or, is it possible that the Q10's e-mail client has a finite limit on the amount of connections it can have open and after say 100 connections are open it is unable to establish any more connections, and so fails - thus showing a status of "disconnected"?

Again, a reboot would cure that.

If so, could this account for why not every user has this problem with Gmail becoming disconnected? I imagine there are some users with 1 e-mail account and very few folders configured, and there are some with a larger number of configured e-mail accounts and folders.

Thus the lower volume users have more "junk connection headroom" than the heavier users?

It would be interesting to know how many IMAP IDLE connections are open when the "not connected" error occurs.

Is there a logging tool available as an app for the Q10 that would show how many IMAP IDLE connections are open at any one time?

Harry

[Omnitech]

Yes, I agree. I like the feature on some of the newer Draytek routers where you can see traffic on the WiFi spectrum and choose a less congested channel.

That's fine as far as it goes but the signal population changes almost by the minute in many places, so it's actually more useful IMHO to have a feature where the device is allowed to continuously monitor the local spectrum and signal quality and switch channels by itself depending on the current conditions.

IMAP IDLE is limited to watching 1 IMAP folder per connection.

So, if a user has 5 folders they want to watch, they need 5 IMAP IDLE connections.

So, if a user has 5 e-mail accounts each with 5 folders in, they need 5 accounts x 5 folders = 25 IMAP IDLE connections.

Correct, which is why in general an IMAP connection for an account that monitors many folders or other sorts of data is almost always less efficient (ie uses more battery power) than something using EAS (Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync), because EAS can provide realtime state-change notifications for the entire account using a SINGLE open socket.

If IMAP NOTIFY was used instead of IMAP IDLE, then it would be possible to monitor multiple folders per connection.

Yes but it's not clear to me how many clients implement this. I would think it is very few at this time, and probably even fewer on the server side.

Now, if that is correct - is it possible that users are ending up with multiple IMAP IDLE connections to the same folder?

Probably not, and why do you ask this?

When the Q10 hands off from WiFi to cellular, or changes its IP address, does it have to close all IMAP IDLE connections under WiFi and re-open them under cellular?

Yes. A TCP socket is IP-address-specific.

Or can IMAP IDLE use the existing connections after handover and not need to close the existing connections?

In theory this should happen - ie TCP session preservation - while roaming within your carrier's IP network, though this is not guaranteed. Sometimes carrier networks are not provisioned in ways friendly to certain internet protocols. For example when the Z10 first rolled-out in Canada, Rogers' network apparently didn't properly support IMAP IDLE (probably excessively short TCP session timeout configuration), so people were not getting timely email notifications when using IMAP. Luckily after customer complaints Rogers made changes and within 1-2 weeks they sorted this.

None of those network design niceties of course will help you if your signal quality drops to the point where the link drops entirely, or at least the IP link. One good way to see if that has happened is to see if the "Blackberry logo" is showing - that indicates an active tunnel to the BlackBerry NOC. Usually when it drops, it's an indication that your internet connection has gone down. (Very occasionally it means there is a BlackBerry NOC failure. But your internet link typically will go down many orders of magnitude more often than BlackBerry's NOC will go down.)

If so, then does it also have to close all existing connections when it switches cell towers - as presumably each cell tower has a different IP address?

A properly designed mobile network should not require a client IP address change when handing-off between towers, but this is not necessarily guaranteed.

If so, then is it possible that during the drive home, going through many cell tower hand overs that multiple connections are being left open in error? Perhaps a RESET packet is not being sent, or is not being handled correctly?

All network elements that process TCP/IP traffic at layer 3 in the OSI model will have an impact on how TCP sessions are handled. This includes a "default timeout" beyond which an unused session or socket is closed if no further activity is detected. Professional equipment commonly has a default timeout of around 30 minutes, some home network equipment will time out an open session/socket in as little as 60 seconds. Equipment can also be designed or configured to be "smart", ie have a default timeout of ie 5 minutes, but if it detects IMAP or EAS traffic on the session, increase its timeout to a higher value. (Having too long of a timeout leads to excessive resource-consumption and makes it easier to successfully attack the network with resource-exhaustion or "DoS" - Denial-of-Service - attacks, too short of a timeout will cause certain protocols to fail under certain circumstances, IMAP is one of them.)

The issue with the "not connected" problem in BB10 is, from what I can tell so far, more a matter of poor session-reliability handling in the native BB10 email client, possibly exacerbated by certain aggressive power-saving algorithms in the BB10 radio code that cause excessive session dropping.

If Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) is being used for the connection then is there additional overhead in the handshake part of the SSL connection protocol to establish that secure connection? Perhaps the cell tower's bandwidth can't handle all of the SSL handshake overhead correctly for "that many" connections?

Not very likely. SSL overhead is mostly in the higher-level processing of encryption math and certificate validity checks done on the client and/or server side, not network traffic. SSL traffic is not compressible the way that plaintext traffic is, so if the link relies on compression to increase effective capacity this may be a factor, but it is not SSL per-se that will cause problems with a tower.

Is it also possible that the Gmail IMAP server has some sort of "upper limit" on the amount of IMAP IDLE connections it will allow at any one time? If this limit is exceeded due to multiple connections being open, then does it disconnect the Q10?

All servers have limits like this, but this would not uniquely impact a BB10 client unless it is making unusually excessive demands on the server, and the server is throttling the connection as a result. (I have seen possible evidence of this perhaps in some EAS scenarios, but I don't think this is most likely what is going on here. It is a small possibility.)

If so, that would that explain why users often report that a re-boot of the Q10 fixes the Gmail "not connected" issue. All connections are closed on shutdown and fresh ones are opened on startup of the device, thus clearing the "junk connections" from the device.

I think in most cases this is more likely because of a bug I have seen with the BB10 radio in 10.1/10.2 which seems to have a bad habit of failing to properly re-establish a WiFi link after signal/link loss. I have this issue with my own devices and a reboot always fixes it. If I walk out of WiFi signal range in my house long enough for the device to switch to the carrier internet service, then return to signal range, either it will not re-acquire the WiFi signal or if it does, it is often a flaky link. (In my case this seems to affect 5Ghz WiFi more than 2.4Ghz WiFi but I have not done any scientific testing on this.)

Or, is it possible that the Q10's e-mail client has a finite limit on the amount of connections it can have open and after say 100 connections are open it is unable to establish any more connections, and so fails - thus showing a status of "disconnected"?

That's possible but since the WiFi session-re-establish failure effect described above affects not just email but also other network communications I do not think the issue there is specific to the native email client.

If so, could this account for why not every user has this problem with Gmail becoming disconnected? I imagine there are some users with 1 e-mail account and very few folders configured, and there are some with a larger number of configured e-mail accounts and folders.

Statistically it is simply more likely for someone like me with 8+ email accounts configured on the device that at least one of them will experience a failure with signal loss than someone with one account configured, depending on where in their polling-schedule the session was when the signal disruption occurred.

It would be interesting to know how many IMAP IDLE connections are open when the "not connected" error occurs.

Unfortunately in my experience BB10 is very poor in the logging department so until they make some improvements there it is hard to know.

Is there a logging tool available as an app for the Q10 that would show how many IMAP IDLE connections are open at any one time?

It may be possible to use a console command to learn some things like this, but the app sandboxing on BB10 tends to make that problematic because without root access (which no user has), you oftentimes can't see processes outside of the sandbox that the tool or app is running in.

[Omnitech]

Yet my Gmail shows connection errors under both the Outlook desktop client AND the Q10.

So, if Gmail can't stay connected under a far more reliable desktop client - there is little wonder it struggles to remain connected in the mobile environment, handing off from cell towers, jumping to different wi-fi networks etc.

You realize that Microsoft Outlook has a reputation for not exactly the greatest IMAP implementation, right?

You should try something like Thunderbird before jumping to that conclusion. What version of Outlook?

A few references to well-known issues with IMAP and Outlook 2007:

Computer Tips: How to deal with Outlook 2007 IMAP idle error
IMAP IDLE support broken in Outlook 2007 B2TR
[Dovecot] outlook2007 shows frequent imap disconnect no matter what outlook-idle setting in dovecot.conf
Outlook. Outlook IMAP-IDLE Limitations (Single Account)


And with later versions of Outlook:

Outlook disconnects after a send receive on IMAP - Microsoft Community
[Dovecot] Outlook 2010 very slow when using IMAP - are there any tweaks?
outlook 2010 and IMAP issues
Outlook IMAP issues
David Klein's Corner: Outlook 2013 Bug when using IMAP - Beware the Bandwidth Blowout!
Outlook imap issues - Technibble Forums

[BruceMoore11]

I changed the Firewall Security Settings on my Telus supplied Actiontec V1000h Wireless router from NAT only to High Security under the Firewall security settings of the Router. This resulted in the same symptoms of no Gmail connection in both Outlook 2013 (connected to the router via land line) and on My BB Q10 (running OS 10.2.0.429) when connected to the router via Wireless LAN.

Changed the Security Settings to Medium and all gmail started to function as per normal on both Outlook and Q10.

Not sure if it is your problem, but it may be worth turning off the firewall and seeing what effect it has on your Q10. If this gets your email working again over wireless, you may have to just adjust your settings (gmail uses port 993 for incoming IMAP server port, and port 465 for SMTP outgoing server).

Hope the helps someone. Have a blessed Advent all!

[Harry_III_UK]

A friend just sent me this picture from her iPhone - so the "Gmail not connecting" issue isn't JUST a BlackBerry problem IMHO...

She says she "always has issues with e-mail" on her iPhone...

[Omnitech]

A friend just sent me this picture from her iPhone - so the "Gmail not connecting" issue isn't JUST a BlackBerry problem IMHO...

She says she "always has issues with e-mail" on her iPhone...

Unfortunately what we don't know by looking at screenshots like that is what the problem actually is, and whose fault it is.

The usual reason for such things is simply a transient loss of internet link. Very common on a mobile device, especially if you're moving around physically.

The problem with BB10 is the problem is a little more complex than that, and the "erase your account credentials" thing makes it much more painful than it should be when it happens.

[Harry_III_UK]

I saw a new message on my Z10 the other day which I have never seen on my Q10 "weakly referenced object no longer exists" after a Gmail drop.



Would that suggest a bug in the Gmail application?

8.11. weakref ? Weak references — Python v2.7.6 documentation

"Using a separate test for �liveness� creates race conditions in threaded applications; another thread can cause a weak reference to become invalidated before the weak reference is called; the idiom shown above is safe in threaded applications as well as single-threaded applications."

[Omnitech]

I saw a new message on my Z10 the other day which I have never seen on my Q10 "weakly referenced object no longer exists" after a Gmail drop.

http://i137.photobucket.com/albums/q...mail-weak.jpeg

Would that suggest a bug in the Gmail application?

8.11. weakref ? Weak references �€” Python v2.7.6 documentation

"Using a separate test for “liveness” creates race conditions in threaded applications; another thread can cause a weak reference to become invalidated before the weak reference is called; the idiom shown above is safe in threaded applications as well as single-threaded applications."

What does "Gmail drop" mean?

Python is a scripting language used all over the place, it could have been something on a website, it could have been something in the BlackBerry, various things.

This is something that appeared when you were in the process of adding an account? Editing an account?

[Harry_III_UK]

What does "Gmail drop" mean?

Sorry - I meant "when my Z10 did not collect or send e-mail using Gmail because the Gmail account became disconnected from my BlackBerry"

This is something that appeared when you were in the process of adding an account? Editing an account?

This is something that "just happened".

Gmail was working fine, and then it just became disconnected. During that time I had been at home, connected to Gmail via my WiFi Router. So, there was no issue with changing an IP address from home to cellular.

Gmail was connected to the same IP address throughout and it just stopped being connected.

I know we have spoken about Outlook desktop client not being the best at handling IMAP in the past, but I have recently noticed an increased frequency of Gmail becoming disconnected on my Q10, my Z10 and the Outlook desktop client.

The mystery continues!

[1wafer]

I am on AOL and I get this message "imap.aol.com is not responding etc.." continually, usually at least once per day. I see some people relate it to switching wifi networks while on the move however, I had this happen to me last night 10 times while sitting in my home watching TV. I took the phone in to my provider today and they changed the settings as I do and sent me on my way. I hoped they did something that I did not since they should be much more knowledgeable at this than I but when I got home I had the "not responding" message again. I never had any such problem on my BB Torch 9800. I just joined this site looking for help and have read some of your posts Omnitech and I have yet to see any actual help regarding this issue that seems to be much more common than it should be. Further more I never hear anyone with other types of phones complain about this. I've had the Q10 for 1 month and I am sick of it.

[Harry_III_UK]

I never had any such problem on my BB Torch 9800.

I agree with you - I'm sick of it too.

However, I have heard of it happening with other devices (Gmail) and with my Outlook desktop client.

Remember though that your Torch would have used BES or BIS - and that is a completely different thing.

[Omnitech]

I am on AOL and I get this message "imap.aol.com is not responding etc.." continually, usually at least once per day. [...]

I never had any such problem on my BB Torch 9800.

The reason for that is because the type of architecture is totally different so if there will be a problem it will never "match exactly" the same problem or error message on something that works completely differently. (The 9800 uses BIS which has a completely different architecture and a different set of limitations)

I just joined this site looking for help and have read some of your posts Omnitech and I have yet to see any actual help regarding this issue that seems to be much more common than it should be.

That's not fair to the people who have contributed here, first of all.

The fact that this problem has not been resolved is because it is a flaw in the operating system. Since I do not design the operating system I cannot personally solve this issue if the problem is an OS flaw.

I'm interested in this issue, I tend to follow email issues here in general quite closely. And the "not connected" issue has actually gotten very much better in recent OS releases. I hope you are using a recent one.

But clearly the problem has not gone away, and remains an issue from time to time. I see it on my own devices running different OS versions from time-to-time. It's a problem. There's no clear solution at this point.

If you're sick of the Q10, then I suggest you return it or sell it and find something more to your liking.

Personally this issue is not significant enough to me personally for it to make a major impact in the usability of my devices. It is just an occasional annoyance at this point for me.

[SoxFan]

I am getting the "weakly referenced object no longer exists" problem all of a sudden with one of my busienss email accounts. I get emails to Outlook just fine, but Blackberry seems to have disconnected the account from receiving emails to this address. How do I fix it?

[kratzer999]

Just had this problem and figure that my ISP is blocking port 25 for smtp. Try Using port 587 instead.