A user, Hyan, reports that after restoring their Discourse site, new user sign-ups no longer receive “Confirm your new account” emails, despite Mailgun working for admin setup and passing email tests. No errors appear in logs. JammyDodger identifies the issue: the setting disable emails is automatically set to ‘non-staff’ post-restore to prevent accidental mass emailing. Hyan confirms this setting was unexpectedly changed and questions when it was applied — JammyDodger and pfaffman clarify it’s a default safety behavior after restores. Hyan notes the lack of admin notification about the setting change and criticizes the misleading “activation email sent” message to users. pfaffman explains a visible banner warns users email is disabled — though Hyan admits missing it — and agrees admins should be explicitly notified post-restore to avoid confusion. The core issue is not a bug but a safety feature that needs better visibility and communication to admins and users.
I use mailgun 587 port for my self-hosting site. And I can receive email when setting up admin account to complete installation. However, when sign up new users my site doesn’t send “Confirm your new account” email. Mailgun logs doesn’t log emails either. There must be something wrong in application? But the production.log doesn’t output error related.
I run discourse-doctor and able to send testing email and I got 10/10 from https://www.mail-tester.com/. I cannot find a similar issue from meta.
Thanks @JammyDodger! Your answer saves tons of my research time.. I didn’t even know there’s such a settings even search through all emails related setting and posts in this forums and I even debugged into code level..
What’s the default value of this settings, it’s “no” I assume? My previous setting is “non-stuff” I don’t know when it’s set? Is it when “migration” as mentioned in this post Send only system emails when disable email setting is on - #5 by Stephen? I did do a data restore operation to the site before signing up new users account.
That’s the one. It’s automatically set to ‘non-staff’ after a restore so as not to inundate everyone with emails. It would normally be ‘no’ by default.
I must miss the message then. I thought there should be a notification for any settings would be changed by the restore. Or much better by
Admin should be notified that any settings are changed due to “restore” (there’s no such message sent now)
In this new user sign-up, they should aware that their activated emails are blocked due to some reasons. rather than the site run as normal sending “An activation emails has sent to your email.. to activate your account …” This is misleading.
Unless you have somehow hidden it with a theme, or there is a new regression, there is a banner at the top of the page that everyone can see. It’s more obvious than a notification.
It’s a little confusing that it will say that an email has been sent when it is blocked by the setting, but there is a banner that should tell people not to try to register for an account.
Thanks further explanation! That’s fine to have a banner (you have to close it or it persists on page top?). Well, the admin/staff should know the ‘disable emails’ should change back to allow users registration.
It’s automatically set to ‘non-staff’ after a restore so as not to inundate everyone with emails. It would normally be ‘no’ by default.