WHAT IS THE MOTIVATION BEHIND THE NEW MAIL CHECKING POLICY?

At LavaNet, responsible growth has always been one of our main guiding philosophies. Currently we are proactively investigating measures we can take to enhance the performance of our main server (malasada) which handles multiple services including access to incoming LavaNet email. Incorporating the new mail checking policy into our email infrastructure is just one of many actions we are taking to provide better and more reliable services to our valued customers.

HOW IS LAVANET DOING THIS?

One of the main contributing factors we have identified which can cause noticeable impact on our server are users who leave copies of their email on the server in combination with checking for mail every few minutes. Accounts set up this way generate large amounts of "disk traffic" as copies of email are moved back an forth during the process of people checking for email. The new mail checking policy will enhance the email servers performance by monitoring and managing the frequency in which email can be checked.

WHAT CAN I DO IF I'M AFFECTED?

Although we expect few users to be affected by this, we have written a document that explains what to do if you get the "login-delay" message. Please contact LavaNet tech support if you still need help -- we will work with you to best meet your needs.

DID LAVANET CONSIDER OTHER OPTIONS TO ADDRESS THE SERVER PERFORMANCE?

Yes. Extensive research has already been done by our system administrators. We have already come up with several options that we can pursue and ranked them according to several factors such as cost, effort, effectiveness and time needed to implement. Based on this list, we will be implementing whatever short term solutions we can do now to provide immediate relief. The options on the bottom of the list address the problem more directly but require more resources to implement such as extensive research, testing, etc. These options may also require scheduled outages so we will only take action on these items once we have confirmed that it's feasible to do so.

HOW DOES THE NEW MAIL CHECKING POLICY WORK?

The new policy will take into account several factors when managing email checking frequencies such as...

• The length of time between checking the same account.
• The size of your mail spool (the cumulative amount/size of emails being stored on the server, NOT on your computer)
• Copies of email are being left on the server

WHO IS AFFECTED BY THESE CHANGES?

The new policy may or may not affect you depending on the previously-mentioned factors. It should only affect those who leave copies of their email on LavaNet's server and/or check for email every few minutes. If you do not do either, you will most likely NOT be affected.

As a result of this change, we expect a significant improvement in performance of all services hosted on our servers such as virtual web servers, shell access, FTP and access to incoming email.

To minimize the disruption of email services, we have decided to implement the new policy in two phases, with phase 1 starting on Wednesday, July 2nd, 2003. Once phase 1 has been in place for two weeks, phase 2 will be activated, on Wednesday, July 16th, 2003.

During the first phase, the allowable email checking frequency will be set at a rather conservative level that should only affect a low percentage of our customer base (those with mail spools 20MB or larger). If you fall into this category, the frequency in which the email system will allow to check for mail will be set to the following parameters:

Email Spool Size (MB)	Minimum Time Between Checking (minutes)
00 - 21	none
21 - 22	0.5
22 - 23	1.0
23 - 24	1.5
[ ... ]	[ ... ]
49 - 50	14.5
50+	15

During the second phase, email checking frequency will be set at a slightly less conservative level which should affect only a slightly higher percentage of our customer base (those with email spools 10MB or larger). For those who fall into this category, the frequency in which you will be able to check for email will be set to the following:

After Wednesday, July 16th, 2003:

Email Spool Size (MB)	Minimum Time Between Checking (minutes)
00 - 11	none
11 - 12	0.5
12 - 13	1.0
13 - 14	1.5
[ ... ]	[ ... ]
39 - 40	14.5
40+	15

Currently only users who are familiar with shell access are able to check the size of their email spool. We do have plans to offer an easier interface to access this information via email or a web page however a release date for this feature has yet to be determined.