E-mail polling on GMAIL not working

Hello,

Since yesterday I am having difficulties polling for gmail replies as shown here:

These are my Google Account security settings:


As you can see I’ve got 2-Step Verification turned off.

I’ve also enabled Account access via this page as explained on this topic.

However, I’ve read somewhere that there might be some problems, because I am based in Slovenia, so our gmail account was created from Slovenia as well whereas our DigitalOcean servers are based in New York.

For example, when I try to log into this email account using a new browser, Gmail requires me to type in a code I receive over SMS message.

And ideas?

Note: and to state the obvious: log in credentials are correct - they were working just 5 days ago.

Thanks!
Mitja

I’m posting the solution here just in case someone else has the same problem.

What actually helped was to switch 2-step verification ON, and create an App password and insert it in the Discourse POP3 password setting instead of my usual Gmail account password

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Yes - that error from gmail is not an authentication failure. It’s asking you to login from a web browser because it think something fishy is going on with the account.

By turning on 2FA you’ve done what gmail was asking - you logged in via a browser.

Are you also using it to send emails?

4 Likes

yeah, but before enabling 2-step verification, logging into via web-browser didn’t help either. Probably because Google cannot make the connection between discourse trying to connect (with DO servers in New York) and me connection from a browser in Slovenia.

I am using Sparkpost to send emails. I created a dedicated basic gmail account only for receiving emails (reply via email) feature.

2 Likes

You can maybe consider this as an alternative?

Straightforward direct-delivery incoming mail

2 Likes

Everything is working now anyway. As far as I understood from the Gmail documentation, it is a recommended approach to give apps, such as Discourse, special App passwords, that you can generate inside your google account security settings, instead of your ‘human’ google password.

I would recommend moving discourse to Amsterdam (it is closer and the newest/best data center) and using the incoming mail server recommended above.

1 Like

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