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Emails and Bouncing - What is it ?
Simply put, 'bouncing' is the internet term for a traffic jam.
- Simple explanation:
On a normal day, you leave home, and get on a bus, or get in your car to go to work.
You get to work, and travel home the same - No traffic problems.
This is how email is supposed to work.. - You send an email & it gets to its destination. They send a reply, and it gets to you.
- SOFT BOUNCING:
This is where, there is a traffic jam slows things down - and your trip to/from work takes longer. However traffic is still flowing (some people may give up... & wait, to travel later).
Soft bouncing is where there is a temporary / short term problem with your email provider.
When there is a "temporary" problem with your email service, the email gets sent back to the person (Yahoogroups) that sent it - advising the problem, Yahoogroups will "hold" the email for a short while - 15-30-60 minutes and try again later.
If the second or third time this happens, Yahoogroups will record your email as a "bounce" and no longer sends THAT particular email. (if the email is not returned back to the Yahoogroups system, it assumes the email as sucessfully sent).
If Yahoogroups has tried to send multiple emails to you, and they all get returned (after trying to re-send it..) Yahoogroups will set your account to "bounce" status, and no longer sends you ANY email from Yahoogroups.
At periodic times, Yahoogroups sends out a "probe" email to you - To see if your email account is still having problems. When you reply to the probe email, Yahoogroups will resume your email delivery to your account.
Usual causes of soft bounces:-
- Mailbox full - (You have not read your email in a while & no more emails can be received.)
- Overloaded Server - (This is where a LOT of emails come into a particular domain name, and the server cannot cope)
- Some causes of this are a lot of "spam" / "viruses" going around the web - Using up precious processing time for the servers.
- HARD BOUNCING:
This is where there is a complete halt to traffic.
EG :- (over-exagerated examples)- You need to cross a major bridge to get to/from work - You get to the bridge and see it is no longer there
(Zapped by aliens in a U.F.O.) - You washed the car yesterday, and this morning, you find that your child has decided to help and washed the inside of your cars
engine.
(you need to call a mechanic in to fix it. - Car flooded in all the wrong places)
Hard bouncing is where there is a permanent / long term problem with your email provider.
Its the same process for soft bouncing - as above - except your email provider sends a different report/code back to Yahoogroups.
Yahoo "occasionally" sends out probes - to test if your account is fixed. However this is less frequently than with soft bouncing.
Usual cause of hard bounces:-
- Your mail provider sends the wrong code to Yahoogroups - tells them you no longer have an email account.
- You need to cross a major bridge to get to/from work - You get to the bridge and see it is no longer there