Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
This is a list of frequently asked questions:
Table of contents
General Questions
A06. Spamihilator and SSL
A05. Spamihilator and Microsoft Exchange
A04. Spamihilator and Hotmail/AOL
A03. Can I use Spamihilator with multiple accounts?
A02. Will spam mails be saved anywhere?
A01. How does the program recognize a spam mail?
A07. How can I block all mails which are not in English?
A08. Why doesn’t Spamihilator send faked error messages back to the spam sender?
A09. May I use Spamihilator in a commercial environment (i.e. on my company’s computers)?
A10. Does Spamihilator work with my e-mail client?
Problems
P01. I get a "Socket-Error" on startup!
P02. I cannot send e-mails anymore!
P03. I cannot receive e-mails anymore!
P04. Spamihilator doesn’t recognize any spam mail
P05. I accidently added an email address to the list of blocked senders. How can I remove it from there?
P06. I accidently emptied the Recycle Bin. How can I get a certain message back?
P07. I accidently deleted a mail from the Training Area. How can I get it back?
P08. When Spamihilator is updated the message “Could not run uninstaller!” appears
General Questions
A06. Spamihilator and SSL
Older versions of Spamihilator (before 0.9.8) do not support SSL. Please disable this feature in your mail client or download the latest program version.
A05. Spamihilator and Microsoft Exchange
Spamihilator only supports POP3 (Post Office Protocol) at this moment. You have to configure your Microsoft Exchange-Server to use POP3.
A04. Spamihilator and Hotmail/AOL
Spamihilator only supports POP3 (Post Office Protocol) at this moment. Unfortunately Hotmail and AOL don’t work with POP3.
A03. Can I use Spamihilator with multiple accounts?
Yes! The Setup-Wizard automatically configures all accounts. Click on “Start/Programs/Spamihilator/Setup-Wizard” to set up each account.
If the Setup-Wizard doesn’t find one of your accounts you will have to configure it manually. Please read the help files:
http://wiki.spamihilator.com/doku.php?id=en:configclient
A02. Will spam mails be saved anywhere?
Usually all e-mails will be downloaded. Messages, that are declared to be spam, will be saved in Spamihilator’s Recycle Bin. You can open it by right-clicking on the Spamihilator icon in your tray. Of course you can undelete messages, view messages and finally delete messages.
Spamihilator takes care of the recycle bin’s content size. Old messages will be deleted automatically.
A01. How does the program recognize a spam mail?
Spamihilator uses two filtering-methods to reach maximum spam protection. By default, Spamihilator scans every new e-mail with the Learning Filter. If this method is not able to classify an e-mail, it will be processed by the Spam-Word-Filter.
There are also several plugins which extend Spamihilator.
The Spam-Word-Filter scans new e-mails for common keywords: So called Spam-Words.
The default installation of Spamihilator has many common spam words predefined. Of course you can add custom spam words. Every keyword has a certain spam-probability. If a word is most likely indicating a spam-mail, its probability should have a value of 100%.
While the Spam-Word-Filter only recognizes common spam words, the Learning Filter also recognizes common non-spam-words, which indicate regular e-mails that should not be deleted. Every word has a certain probability. With the rules defined from Thomas Bayes (English mathematician, 18. century) Spamihilator calculates whether an e-mail is spam or not. This filtering method is also called Bayesian Method or Bayesian Filter.
In addition you can add e-mail addresses to the list of blocked senders. You will find this list in the options dialog.
A07. How can I block all mails which are not in English?
Use the Training Area frequently and mark all messages which are not English as Spam and the other ones as Non-spam. Eventually the program will learn to differentiate between English and other languages and so it will be able to block all foreign mails.
A08. Why doesn’t Spamihilator send faked error messages back to the spam sender?
It’s a nice idea to send faked error messages back to the spam sender, so that he might think the respective mail account does not exist or that his own account will get jammed. Unfortunately this is considered counterproductive, for the following reasons:
- Most spam senders use their mail accounts only once, just to send a few spam mails. After that they delete these accounts. Sending faked error messages would produce further error messages which will be sent back to you.
- Usually spam senders fake their e-mail addresses or even use the ones of other Internet users. Hence, faked error messages could get into the mailboxes of innocent people!
- You cannot thoroughly fake an error message. Spam senders could find out that the message is faked and, thus, that there is a real person behind your mail address.
A09. May I use Spamihilator in a commercial environment (i.e. on my company’s computers)?
Spamihilator is Freeware and, thus, you can use it on your private computer or on any computer at your company for free. You don’t have to pay anything. You can find more information in the Spamihilator License.
A10. Does Spamihilator work with my e-mail client?
Basically, Spamihilator works with all e-mail clients supporting POP3 or IMAP. The Setup Wizard is able to configure the following programs automatically: Outlook 2000/XP/2003/Express, Eudora, Mozilla Thunderbird, IncrediMail, Pegasus Mail, Phoenix Mail and Opera.
Other mail clients have to be configured manually. Please have a look at the online help.
Problems
P01. I get a "Socket-Error" on startup!
There is another programm installed on your PC using the POP3-Port 110. Open Spamihilator’s settings dialog by right-clicking the program icon in the tray area and choosing "Settings". Open "Connection" and change the POP3-Port from 110 to another value. I suggest 120.
Restart the program. "Socket-Error" should not appear again.
Now you have to change the settings in your e-mail client. Open your account settings. Choose "Server-Settings" or "Connection-Settings" or something like that and change the port of the POP3-Server to the same value you entered in Spamihilator.
Now, everything should work.
P02. I cannot send e-mails anymore!
Your e-mail provider requires authentication before you can send e-mails, but Spamihilator changes your user name in your e-mail client.
In Outlook you can enable the authentication as follows:
Launch Outlook and open your account settings. Choose your e-mail account from the list and click on "Properties". Open the "Server" pane and enable the option "Server-Authentication" (below). Click on the "Settings" button. Enter your right user name and your right password. Close the dialog by clicking on OK.
In Eudora you cannot specify an extra-username for outgoing connections. You have to follow the advices of Qualcomm:
http://www.eudora.com/techsupport/kb/2107hq.html
P03. I cannot receive e-mails anymore!
Please make sure, that the "Secure Password Authentication" is disabled in the account settings of your e-mail client, since Spamihilator doesn’t support the AUTH command yet.
Maybe you have a Firewall installed. Please make sure that it doesn’t prevent Spamihilator to fully access the Internet. The program should be able to act as a local mail server, too.
On some systems the e-mail client is not able to resolve the address of the local POP3 server “localhost”. In this case, open the e-mail client’s account settings and change the POP3 server from “localhost” to “127.0.0.1″ (without quotation marks).
P04. Spamihilator doesn’t recognize any spam mail
Please make sure that your e-mail client is configured properly. If you’re downloading messages and the yellow status window does not show up, you have to configure your e-mail client manually.
You can either use the Setup-Wizard (Start/Programs/Spamihilator/Setup-Wizard) or configure your client by hand. Therefor read the help files.
Furthermore make sure, that the spam-filters are not disabled. Open Spamihilator’s settings dialog and click on "Filter-Properties". Enable all filters (like the Learning Filter and the Spam-Word-Filter).
P05. I accidently added an email address to the list of blocked senders. How can I remove it from there?
Right click Spamihilator’s main icon in the tray area in the right bottom corner of your screen. Choose “Settings” from the menu to open Spamihilator’s settings window. Click “Blocked Senders” in the list view on the left and then select the address you want to remove in the list view on the right. Delete it via the “Delete” button.P06. I accidently emptied the Recycle Bin. How can I get a certain message back?
The Recycle Bin is the last resort for mails deleted by Spamihilator. It works just like the Windows Recycle Bin or your real bin beneath your desk: If you empty it all items will be lost forever. You cannot restore a message from an empty Recycle Bin.
There is a real chance a copy of the mail you’re looking for is still in the Training Area. If you find it there you may view it, but you will not be able to transfer it to your mail client’s inbox anymore.
P07. I accidently deleted a mail from the Training Area. How can I get it back?
Please note that the Training Area just saves a copy of every incoming mail. The real message is either in Spamihilator’s Recycle Bin (if it has been declared as Spam before) or in your mail client’s inbox.