From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 4 11:25:05 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id KAA13450 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 4 Jan 1996 10:59:21 -0800 (PST) Received: from SYSWRK.UCIS.Dal.Ca ([129.173.2.108]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with ESMTP id KAA13445 for ; Thu, 4 Jan 1996 10:59:16 -0800 (PST) Received: from 129.173.1.100 by SYSWRK.UCIS.DAL.CA (PMDF V4.3-13 #6307) id <01HZM760GUQO004KHK@SYSWRK.UCIS.DAL.CA>; Thu, 04 Jan 1996 14:52:30 -0400 Received: from biome.bio.dfo.ca ("port 4830"@biome.BIO.dfo.ca) by AC.DAL.CA (PMDF V4.3-13 #6307) id <01HZM73UET0000NQOA@AC.DAL.CA>; Thu, 04 Jan 1996 14:50:55 -0400 Received: by biome.bio.dfo.ca (931110.SGI/931108.SGI.ANONFTP) for @ac.dal.ca:List-managers@GreatCircle.COM id AA16945; Thu, 4 Jan 96 14:48:51 -0400 Date: Thu, 04 Jan 1996 14:48:51 -0400 (AST) From: bill@biome.bio.dfo.ca (Bill Silvert) Subject: E-mail to HTML To: List-managers@GreatCircle.COM Message-id: <9601041848.AA16945@biome.bio.dfo.ca> MIME-version: 1.0 X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL23] Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk I was away then this string appeared, but I use MHonArc at this site and it does a fine job of turning a mail spool file into HTML. I don't know if my copy is current, but this and lots of other really great goodies by Earl Hood are at http://www.oac.uci.edu/indiv/ehood/ If MHonArc doesn't do exactly what you want, perhaps you will find something else here that does. Bill Silvert >Date: Sun, 24 Dec 1995 13:54:30 -0500 >From: selene@niagara.com (Rowan Shirkie) >Subject: E-mail to HTML > >Does anyone have any experience with the E-mail to HTML software that they >could share? > >I want to create an HTML archive of my digests, and point WWW >browser-surfers and new mailing list subscribers to it. I would use the WWW >site to publish the mailing list "info" file and list policies as well, >making it a sort of self-serve request processor. > >That way, I figure people with only a casual interest can come and go >without churning subscriptions. New subscribers can avoid revisiting topics >that have outlived their interest lifespan on the list itself. > >I have seen Hypermail. Does any one have experience with it? Or any other >converter? -- Bill Silvert, Habitat Ecology Section, Habitat Science Division Bedford Institute of Oceanography, P. O. Box 1006 Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, CANADA B2Y 4A2 HED runs a WWW server at URL=http://hed.bio.dfo.ca From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 4 20:37:26 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id UAA25526 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 4 Jan 1996 20:28:45 -0800 (PST) Received: from nic.iii.net (nic.iii.net [199.232.40.3]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id UAA25501 for ; Thu, 4 Jan 1996 20:28:39 -0800 (PST) Received: from kenmoto1.iii.net (kenmoto1.iii.net [199.232.41.216]) by nic.iii.net (8.6.8/8.6.6) with SMTP id XAA09462; Thu, 4 Jan 1996 23:27:59 -0500 Date: Thu, 4 Jan 1996 23:27:59 -0500 Message-Id: <199601050427.XAA09462@nic.iii.net> X-Sender: bourbeau@mail.iii.net (Unverified) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: list-managers@GreatCircle.COM From: bourbeau@kenmoto1.iii.net (Ken Bourbeau) Subject: Mailto: Rod Stewart ? Cc: flash@rochgte.fidonet.org (Elaine Naiman) X-Mailer: Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Certainly not very technical, certainly not very original, but I hope effective..... Ever since putting the "mailto:" on the web pages for my lists, I've received clueless email. Now I've removed the mailto from my main pages and replaced them with a link to a page that explains the function of a mailing list, the difference between administrative addresses and list addresses, and "NO, you are NOT writing to Rod Stewart by clicking here!!" ;-) At the bottom of the tutorial, are "mailto:" commands. Hope it works. Best to ya from the Sticks o New Hampshire, Kenny *********************************************************** Ken Bourbeau Home Page: http://www.iii.net/users/bourbeau/ Maria McKee Mailinglist email: mckeefan-request@nic.iii.net Rod Stewart Digest email: rodfans@kenmoto1.iii.net *********************************************************** From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 4 21:55:55 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id VAA27118 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 4 Jan 1996 21:40:48 -0800 (PST) Received: from access2.digex.net (access2.digex.net [205.197.245.193]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id VAA27113 for ; Thu, 4 Jan 1996 21:40:45 -0800 (PST) Received: (from asgilman@localhost) by access2.digex.net (8.6.12/8.6.12) id AAA27044 ; for ; Fri, 5 Jan 1996 00:39:59 -0500 From: Al Gilman Message-Id: <199601050539.AAA27044@access2.digex.net> Subject: Re: Mailto: Rod Stewart ? To: bourbeau@kenmoto1.iii.net (Ken Bourbeau) Date: Fri, 5 Jan 1996 00:39:58 -0500 (EST) Cc: list-managers@GreatCircle.COM, flash@rochgte.fidonet.org In-Reply-To: <199601050427.XAA09462@nic.iii.net> from "Ken Bourbeau" at Jan 4, 96 11:27:59 pm X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL25] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk From: bourbeau@kenmoto1.iii.net (Ken Bourbeau) Ever since putting the "mailto:" on the web pages for my lists, I've received clueless email. Now I've removed the mailto from my main pages and replaced them with a link to a page that explains the function of a mailing list, the difference between administrative addresses and list addresses, and "NO, you are NOT writing to Rod Stewart by clicking here!!" ;-) At the bottom of the tutorial, are "mailto:" commands. Hope it works. Good. I suspect you may need to instruct readers to make a bookmark pointing to this sign-on/sign-off page before offering them a sign-on mailto:, to make this approach mostly successful. c.f. this .sig that I have composed but failed to get implemented on Lynx-dev: >>-- This message is coming to you from the Lynx-dev discussion list. --<< http://www.cc.ukans.edu/about_lynx/lynx-dev/about_lynx-dev.html --for info mailto:listproc@listproc.cc.ukans.edu --for list administration >>-- UNSUB LYNX-DEV gets you off the list, HELP gets instructions. --<< The page you get to by the "for info" reference contains fully spelled commands but not clickable subscribe/unsubscribe actions. From list-managers-owner Sat Jan 6 15:04:58 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id OAA27777 for list-managers-outgoing; Sat, 6 Jan 1996 14:36:02 -0800 (PST) Received: from [192.104.183.130] ([192.104.183.130]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with ESMTP id OAA03527 for ; Fri, 5 Jan 1996 14:13:09 -0800 (PST) Received: from calunet.com (192.104.183.129) by [192.104.183.130] with SMTP (Apple Internet Mail Server 1.0); Fri, 5 Jan 1996 16:10:47 -0600 Date: Fri, 5 Jan 96 16:10:19 -0500 From: MacMikeal@calunet.com (MacMikeal) Organization: CaluNET Online, Inc. Subject: Help!! To: list-managers@greatcircle.com Message-ID: <3104097.ensmtp@calunet.com> X-Mailer: ExpressNet/SMTP v1.1.4 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk I maintain a E-Mail mailing list titled The East Tennessee List. It currently has around 100 subscribers. Currently I have had to split the list into 4 address book entries on my internet provider. Each message has to be sent to me and then I have to make 4 copies of each and manually send them back out. I wrote to the man I heard of that wrote a program called List Processor. He suggested to write you and see if any one site would become host to my list? I need to be able to have a "closed" list that is any subscribing to the list be done by me. The subscriber would be able to unsubscribe himself. Digest operation would need to be available. This is a list that is made available to Preachers who preach for the Conservative branch of the churches of Christ. If you can help please E-mail me. Mike Hughes 204 Prairie Street Lowell, IN 46356 (219)696-2436 MacMikeal@calunet.com Also subscribe me to your list. - via BulkRate 2.1 -- -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Sent via CaluNET Online, Inc. The premier online information service for the calumet region Voice Customer Service: 219.937.5757 Call Customer Service to request an account and client software Internet Email: admin@calunet.com -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- From list-managers-owner Sat Jan 6 15:05:06 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id OAA27733 for list-managers-outgoing; Sat, 6 Jan 1996 14:35:17 -0800 (PST) Received: from sgi.sgi.com (SGI.COM [192.48.153.1]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id RAA23426 for ; Thu, 4 Jan 1996 17:32:34 -0800 (PST) Received: from lunch.engr.sgi.com by sgi.sgi.com via ESMTP (950405.SGI.8.6.12/910110.SGI) for <@sgi.sgi.com:list-managers@greatcircle.com> id RAA23498; Thu, 4 Jan 1996 17:31:57 -0800 Received: by lunch.engr.sgi.com (950511.SGI.8.6.12.PATCH526/940406.SGI.AUTO) for list-managers@greatcircle.com id RAA11478; Thu, 4 Jan 1996 17:31:56 -0800 From: pdc@lunch.engr.sgi.com (Paul Close) Message-Id: <199601050131.RAA11478@lunch.engr.sgi.com> Subject: Re: E-mail to HTML To: list-managers@greatcircle.com Date: Thu, 4 Jan 1996 17:31:54 -0800 (PST) X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.5 PL0a8s] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk >Date: Sun, 24 Dec 1995 13:54:30 -0500 >From: selene@niagara.com (Rowan Shirkie) >Subject: E-mail to HTML > >Does anyone have any experience with the E-mail to HTML software that they >could share? > >I want to create an HTML archive of my digests, and point WWW >browser-surfers and new mailing list subscribers to it. I would use the WWW >site to publish the mailing list "info" file and list policies as well, >making it a sort of self-serve request processor. > >That way, I figure people with only a casual interest can come and go >without churning subscriptions. New subscribers can avoid revisiting topics >that have outlived their interest lifespan on the list itself. > >I have seen Hypermail. Does any one have experience with it? Or any other >converter? I have a home-grown digest-to-html program that uses perl 5.0. I have an older one that uses perl 4.0, but it requires a more ridgid digest format (my majordomo digest program, pretty well). The reason I wrote my own was that the others, like Hypermail, only worked on mail files, not digests. And all my archives are digests, so I was stuck. Hypermail is particularly bad for that because it only parses mailbox "From " style lines, not Arpa-style "From: " lines (one has a colon, one doesn't; more importantly, digests only have the latter). The other reason was I like perl and html :-) Note that my script needs a little tweaking for the "end of digest" message (look for "End of Volume"), and the digest name / date / volume number infor from the title. Look around line 137 for that. To see a real-life example of the output, check out: http://reality.sgi.com/employees/pdc/bass/v02q4/topics.html http://reality.sgi.com/employees/pdc/bass/v02q4/contents.html Note that subjects are linked together, so from any subject you can jump to the next or previous subject. #! /bin/sh # This is a shell archive. Remove anything before this line, then feed it # into a shell via "sh file" or similar. To overwrite existing files, # type "sh file -c". # The tool that generated this appeared in the comp.sources.unix newsgroup; # send mail to comp-sources-unix@uunet.uu.net if you want that tool. # If this archive is complete, you will see the following message at the end: # "End of shell archive." # Contents: digest_to_html.perl # Wrapped by pdc@lunch.engr.sgi.com on Thu Jan 4 17:24:47 1996 PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/ucb ; export PATH if test -f 'digest_to_html.perl' -a "${1}" != "-c" ; then echo shar: Will not clobber existing file \"'digest_to_html.perl'\" else echo shar: Extracting \"'digest_to_html.perl'\" \(7960 characters\) sed "s/^X//" >'digest_to_html.perl' <<'END_OF_FILE' X#!/usr/bin/perl5 -w X X$header_sep = "\n+Topics:[^\000]*?\n--------------------*\n+"; X$message_sep = "\n+--------------------*\n+(?=From:|Subject:|Date:)"; X Xundef %subjcount; # avoid "used only once" warnings X X$dir = "."; X Xwhile ($ARGV[0] =~ m/^(-.*)/ && shift) { X if ($1 eq "-d") { X $dir = shift; X } else { X die "usage $0 [-d html_dir] file [file...]\n"; X } X} X Xundef($/); X$* = 1; X Xopen(CONTENTS, ">$dir/contents.html") || X die "Can't open $dir/contents.html: $!\n"; Xopen(TOPICS, ">$dir/topics.html") || X die "Can't open $dir/topics.html: $!\n"; X X# X# Pass 1 -- Read each file and get a list of subjects. This is only so X# we can be nice and offer to jump to the next article with X# the same subject. X# X Xprint "Pass 1...\n"; X Xforeach $file (@ARGV) { X next if $file =~ /\.html$/; X open(DIGEST, "<$file") || warn "Can't open $file: $!\n",next; X print "$file\n"; X $_ = ; # read the whole file X close(DIGEST); X X push(@okayfiles, $file); X $file =~ s!.*/!!; X X # split off digest header X if (!/$header_sep/o) { X print "$file: header split didn't work: \$header_sep probably not right for this digest!\n"; X $body = $_; X } X else { X $body = $'; X } X if (! $body =~ /$message_sep/o) { X print "$file: message split didn't work: \$message_sep probably not right for this digest!\n"; X } X # just /$message_sep/o should work, but doesn't, perl5.001n X eval "\@msgs = split(/$message_sep/, \$body)"; # split body into messages X X $subjno = 0; X X foreach $msg (@msgs){ X $subjno++; X $subj = ""; X ($msg =~ /^Subject:\s+(.*)/m) && ($subj=$1); X X $subj =~ s/&/&/g; # html escape seqs X $subj =~ s//>/g; X $subj =~ s/"/"/g; X X $subj =~ s/\s+$//; X X # massage Subject for topics X X 1 while ($subj =~ s/^Re(2|\[\d+\])?[: ]\s*//i); # trim all Re:'s X if ($subj !~ /^\s*$/ && X $subj !~ /\w+ Digest, Volume \d+,/i && X $subj !~ /\w+ Digest V\d+ #\d+/i) X { X # X # Make a key that's all lower case, and all alpha-numeric to X # reduce duplicate topics that differ only by those. This X # also results in a list of topics sorted case-independent. X # X ($key = $subj) =~ tr/A-Z/a-z/; X $key =~ s/&(amp|lt|gt|quot);//g; X $key =~ s/\W+//g; X $subjrefs{$key} .= "$file.html#$subjno\001"; X if (!defined($realsubj{$key})) { X $realsubj{$key} = $subj; X } X } X } X} X Xprint "Pass 2...\n"; X X# X# Pass 2 -- Read each file AGAIN (hey, that's what file system caches are X# for, right?) and write out an HTML version while writing the X# by-date and by-subject files as we go. X# X# The files could be stored as they were read in, but that X# increases memory usage.... This is left as an exercise X# to the reader :-) X# X Xforeach $file (@okayfiles) { X open(DIGEST, "<$file") || warn "Can't open $file: $!\n",next; X $_ = ; # read the whole file X close(DIGEST); X X $file =~ s!.*/!!; X open(HTML,">$dir/$file.html") || X warn "Can't open $dir/$file.html: $!\n",next; X print "$dir/$file.html\n"; X X $subjno = 0; X s/&/&/g; # html escape seqs X s//>/g; X s/"/"/g; X X /$header_sep/o; # split off digest header X $hdr = "$`$&"; X $body = $'; X $body =~ s/\n+----*\s*End of Volume \d+\s*-----*[\n\s]+\Z//i; X @hdrs = split(/\n\n+/, $hdr); # split hdr by paragraphs X # just /$message_sep/o should work, but doesn't, perl5.001n X eval "\@msgs = split(/$message_sep/, \$body)"; # split body into messages X X shift(@hdrs); # skip mail header X $first = shift(@hdrs); # grab first line X #pop(@hdrs); # ... and topics X #pop(@hdrs); # ... and delimiter X do { $tmp=pop(@hdrs); } until $tmp =~ /Topics/; X X ($title,$volume,$date) = $first =~ /(.*Digest),\s+((?:Volume|Issue).*?),\s+(.*)/; X if ($title eq "" || $volume eq "" || $date eq "") { X print "$file: title wasn't parsed right: \$title = $title, \$volume = $volume, \$date = $date\n"; X } X X print HTML "$title, $volume\n"; X print HTML "

$title

\n

$date
$volume

\n"; X print HTML "
",join("\n\n",@hdrs),"
\n
\n
Topics:
\n"; X X if (!$contents_title) { X $contents_title = "$title Archives"; X print CONTENTS "$contents_title by Digest Date\n"; X print CONTENTS "

$contents_title by Digest Date

\n"; X } X if (!$first_date) { X $first_date = $date; X } X $last_date = $date; X X print CONTENTS qq!

$title, $volume
!, X "$date

\n"; X print CONTENTS "
Contents:
\n"; X X foreach $msg (@msgs) { X #print ">>>$msg<<<\n"; #debug X $subjno++; X $msg_count++; X $subj = ""; X $from = ""; X ($msg =~ /^Subject:\s+(.*)/m) && ($subj=$1); X $subj =~ s/\s+$//; X X # massage From X X if ($msg =~ /^From: (.*)/im) { X $_ = $1; X if (/(.*)<.*>/) { X $from = $1; X } X elsif (/\((.*)\)/) { X $from = $1; X } X else { X $from = $_; X } X $from =~ s/^\s+//; X $from =~ s/\s+$//; X $from =~ s/^"(.*)"$/$1/; X $expr = $from; X $expr =~ s/([\[\]\(\)\*\+\?\.])/\\$1/g; X $msg =~ s/^From:\s+(.*)($expr)(.*)/From: $1$2<\/em>$3/im; X } X X # massage message body X X $msg =~ s/^Subject:\s+(.*)/Subject: $1<\/STRONG>/im; X# $msg =~ s/\n/
\n/g; X $msg =~ s/^(>.*)/$1<\/EM>/gm; X $msg = qq!
\n$msg\n
\n!; X X if ($from ne "" && $subj ne "") { X print HTML qq!$subj
\n!; X print CONTENTS qq!$subj!, X ", $from
\n"; X } X X # massage Subject for topics X X 1 while ($subj =~ s/^Re(2|\[\d+\])?[: ]\s*//i); # trim all Re:'s X if ($subj !~ /^\s*$/ && X $subj !~ /\w+ Digest, Volume \d+,/i && X $subj !~ /\w+ Digest V\d+ #\d+/i) X { X # Make a key just like in pass 1. X ($key = $subj) =~ tr/A-Z/a-z/; X $key =~ s/&(amp|lt|gt|quot);//g; X $key =~ s/\W+//g; X #if (!defined($subjlist{$key})) {$subjlist{$key} = ""} X $subjlist{$key} .= "$file.html#$subjno\002$from\002$date\001"; X @subjref = split("\001", $subjrefs{$key}); X $idx = $subjcount{$key}++; X if ($#subjref >= 0 && $subjref[$idx] ne "$file.html#$subjno") { X print "$key missed subj sequence!\n"; X print "\$#subjref = $#subjref, \$idx = $idx, \$subjref[$idx] = $subjref[$idx]\n"; X print "expected $file.html#$subjno\n"; X } X if ($#subjref <= 0) { X # nothing X } elsif ($idx > $#subjref) { X print "error! \$idx ($idx) > \$#subjref ($#subjref), $key\n"; X } elsif ($idx == 0) { X $msg .= "\n

[no prev subject] " . X "[next subject]" . X "
\n"; X } elsif ($idx == $#subjref) { X $msg .= "\n

" . X "[prev subject] " . X "[no next subject]
\n"; X } else { X $msg .= "\n

" . X "[prev subject] " . X "[next subject]" . X "
\n"; X } X } X } X X print CONTENTS "
\n"; X X print HTML "
\n",join("
\n",@msgs),"\n"; X X close HTML; X} X Xclose(CONTENTS); X Xprint TOPICS "$contents_title by Subject\n"; Xprint TOPICS "

$contents_title by Subject

\n"; Xprint TOPICS "Starting: $first_date
\n"; Xprint TOPICS "Ending: $last_date
\n"; Xprint TOPICS "Messages: $msg_count
\n"; Xprint TOPICS "
    \n"; X Xforeach $key (sort keys %subjlist) { X # X # for each subject, record each file it was found in X # X @msgs = split("\001", $subjlist{$key}); X X if ($realsubj{$key} eq "") { X print "huh? lost subject for key \"$key\"!\n"; X } X print TOPICS "
  • $realsubj{$key}\n
      \n"; X foreach $msg (@msgs) { X ($url,$from,$date) = split("\002", $msg, 3); X print TOPICS qq!
    • $from, $date\n!; X } X print TOPICS "
    \n\n"; X} X Xprint TOPICS "
\n"; X Xclose(TOPICS); END_OF_FILE if test 7960 -ne `wc -c <'digest_to_html.perl'`; then echo shar: \"'digest_to_html.perl'\" unpacked with wrong size! fi chmod +x 'digest_to_html.perl' # end of 'digest_to_html.perl' fi echo shar: End of shell archive. exit 0 -- Paul Close pdc@sgi.com http://reality.sgi.com/employees/pdc/ No fate but what we make From list-managers-owner Sat Jan 6 16:14:37 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id QAA29576 for list-managers-outgoing; Sat, 6 Jan 1996 16:14:16 -0800 (PST) Received: from village.ios.com (village.ios.com [198.4.75.49]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id QAA29571 for ; Sat, 6 Jan 1996 16:14:12 -0800 (PST) Received: (from gsp@localhost) by village.ios.com (8.6.11/8.6.9) id TAA17529; Sat, 6 Jan 1996 19:04:44 -0500 Date: Sat, 6 Jan 1996 19:04:40 -0500 (EST) From: Daniel Pfarrer To: MacMikeal cc: list-managers@GreatCircle.COM Subject: Re: Help!! In-Reply-To: <3104097.ensmtp@calunet.com> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk You can get a mailing list host for a small fee from the PoBox company. They use the majordomo program. URL: http://www.pobox.com/p2/other.html On Fri, 5 Jan 1996, MacMikeal wrote: > I maintain a E-Mail mailing list titled The East Tennessee List. It currently > has around 100 subscribers. Currently I have had to split the list into 4 > address book entries on my internet provider. Each message has to be sent to > me and then I have to make 4 copies of each and manually send them back out. > I wrote to the man I heard of that wrote a program called List Processor. He > suggested to write you and see if any one site would become host to my list? I > need to be able to have a "closed" list that is any subscribing to the list be > done by me. The subscriber would be able to unsubscribe himself. Digest > operation would need to be available. > This is a list that is made available to Preachers who preach for the > Conservative branch of the churches of Christ. > If you can help please E-mail me. > > Mike Hughes > 204 Prairie Street > Lowell, IN 46356 > (219)696-2436 > MacMikeal@calunet.com > > > Also subscribe me to your list. > > - via BulkRate 2.1 > > > -- > > -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- > Sent via CaluNET Online, Inc. > The premier online information service for the calumet region > Voice Customer Service: 219.937.5757 > Call Customer Service to request an account and client software > Internet Email: admin@calunet.com > -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- > > $**************************************************************************$ * Daniel Pfarrer (DP108) SBA: daniel.pfarrer@sbaonline.gov * * CEO & System Administrator CompuServe: 71324.212@compuserve.com * * of GSP Services, Inc. Sys Admin: admin@gsp.com * * Located in Washington, DC, USA Business: dpfarrer@gsp.com * * For more info, e-mail info@gsp.com gsp@village.ios.com * * "Balance the Budget!" WWW: http://village.ios.com/~gsp/ * $**************************************************************************$ From list-managers-owner Sun Jan 7 12:14:39 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id MAA15323 for list-managers-outgoing; Sun, 7 Jan 1996 12:09:11 -0800 (PST) Received: from miso.wwa.com (miso.wwa.com [198.49.174.33]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id MAA15318 for ; Sun, 7 Jan 1996 12:09:08 -0800 (PST) Received: by miso.wwa.com (Smail3.1.29.1 #2) id m0tZ1O0-000Y1eC; Sun, 7 Jan 96 14:08 CST Message-Id: From: dattier@wwa.com (David W. Tamkin) Subject: How was "-request" coined? To: list-managers@greatcircle.com Date: Sun, 7 Jan 1996 14:08:12 -0600 (CST) X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL23] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk The discussion came up in November or December about people who don't find out what the "-request" suffix really means and assume that it's where one sends requests ... not in the correct sense of requests about the list but under the pre-jumped conclusion that the address is for requests about the topic. Non-members write there with questions that they should (join the list for and then) ask on the list, thinking they've reached some sort of question-and-answer service. When I ran the Toyota Corolla List, people used to write in out of the blue asking for parts and manuals (and only a few of them made any reference to willingness to pay for the items, much less the shipping) or for free repair or purchase advice. I still run the Party of Five List, and people write to its -request address asking for information about the stars or even photo- graphs, not to mention production and broadcast schedules. So I'm wondering, how was the suffix "-request" coined? How did the conven- tion of calling the two addresses "listname@site" and "listname-request@site" get started? What was the reasoning behind those two particular names, if anyone on this list in 1996 ever knew and still remembers? (Yes, I under- stand why there are two addresses and not just one; anyone who explains that to me did not read my question.) David Tamkin From list-managers-owner Sun Jan 7 14:14:40 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id OAA17197 for list-managers-outgoing; Sun, 7 Jan 1996 14:02:01 -0800 (PST) Received: from schoneal.com (wildride.schoneal.com [206.81.38.2]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id OAA17189 for ; Sun, 7 Jan 1996 14:01:35 -0800 (PST) Received: (from meo@localhost) by schoneal.com (8.6.11/8.6.11) id QAA25254; Sun, 7 Jan 1996 16:01:01 -0600 Message-Id: <199601072201.QAA25254@schoneal.com> Subject: Re: How was "-request" coined? To: dattier@wwa.com (David W. Tamkin) Date: Sun, 7 Jan 1996 16:01:01 -0600 (CST) Cc: list-managers@GreatCircle.COM In-Reply-To: From: meo@schoneal.com (Miles O'Neal) Reply-To: meo@schoneal.com (Miles O'Neal) Organization: Schober O'Neal, Inc / Net Ads X-WWW-URL: http://www.schoneal.com/~meo/ X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL24] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk David W. Tamkin said... | |So I'm wondering, how was the suffix "-request" coined? How did the conven- |tion of calling the two addresses "listname@site" and "listname-request@site" |get started? What was the reasoning behind those two particular names, if |anyone on this list in 1996 ever knew and still remembers? (Yes, I under- |stand why there are two addresses and not just one; anyone who explains that |to me did not read my question.) Please add me top the list. Please remove me from the list. Sounds like requests to me... -Miles meo@schoneal.com From list-managers-owner Sun Jan 7 16:19:35 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id PAA18496 for list-managers-outgoing; Sun, 7 Jan 1996 15:35:11 -0800 (PST) Received: from [198.102.244.42] (pb520.greatcircle.com [198.102.244.42]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id PAA18475; Sun, 7 Jan 1996 15:35:05 -0800 (PST) X-Sender: brent@miles.greatcircle.com Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Sun, 7 Jan 1996 15:35:22 +0100 To: dattier@wwa.com (David W. Tamkin), list-managers@greatcircle.com From: Brent@GreatCircle.COM (Brent Chapman) Subject: Re: How was "-request" coined? Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 2:08 PM 1/7/96, David W. Tamkin wrote: >So I'm wondering, how was the suffix "-request" coined? How did the conven- >tion of calling the two addresses "listname@site" and "listname-request@site" >get started? What was the reasoning behind those two particular names, if >anyone on this list in 1996 ever knew and still remembers? (Yes, I under- >stand why there are two addresses and not just one; anyone who explains that >to me did not read my question.) An interesting question... I did a little digging (the net is a wonderful thing!), and I think I may have found it... First, a key piece of trivia: RISKS, HUMANETS, and SF-LOVERS are some of the oldest mailing lists on the Internet, having been started back before it even WAS the Internet. I.e., when these lists were started, it was still the ARPANET, and people's email addresses were simply hostnames, without a domain part, such as "Brent@UCBARPA"; often, in fact, it was shown as "Brent at UCBARPA". I figured I'd go back through the archives of these very old lists, and see if I could find the first reference to "-request" in each. The very first issue of RISKS-Digest from August 1, 1985 says that administrative requests should be directed to "RISKS-Request@SRI-CSL.ARPA", so the convention was already well-established by that time. I couldn't find an on-line archive of HUMANETS, but I didn't look very hard. I think I hit paydirt with SF-Lovers, though. Below is a message I came up with from the first volume of the SF-Lovers archive (available for anonymous FTP from sflovers.rutgers.edu; the full file reference is ftp://sflovers.rutgers.edu/pub/sf-lovers/Digest/sf-lovers.v1), from 1979. Unless Roger Duffey (the author of the message below, and the manager of the SF-LOVERS mailing list at the time) was copying the practices of some other list, it looks like he invented the -request convention for SF-Lovers. I don't see any indication that he was taking the idea from somebody else, though; the text above makes it sound like he'd just come up with this idea to solve the problem at hand. I find it particularly amusing that "how to manage mailing lists" (i.e., the charter of List-Managers) was apparently already a topic of consideration and debate in 1979... :-) -Brent ----------------------+----------------------------+------------------------ Brent Chapman | Great Circle Associates | 1057 West Dana Street Brent@GreatCircle.COM | http://www.greatcircle.com | Mountain View, CA 94041 ----------------------+----------------------------+------------------------ Internet Tutorials from the Experts! >Date: 30 DEC 1979 0058-EST >From: DUFFEY at MIT-AI (Roger D. Duffey, II) >Subject: I'm in charge! (and with a loooong message too) >To: SF-LOVERS at MIT-AI > >Alan and everyone, > > Peace Alan. Either I have sent messages or someone else >has announced about four times now that I am responsible for >maintaining the SF-LOVERS mailing list. My name is Roger >Duffey, and my net address is DUFFEY@MIT-AI. After tonight >you can also send complaints/questions/requests about the >SF-LOVERS mailing list to SF-LOVERS-REQUEST@MIT-AI and they >will automatically be forwarded to me. > Actually, the majority of the people requesting to be >added to SF-LOVERS have been sending mail directly to me, >not to everyone. Otherwise you would all be seeing somewhat >more mail than you are. This list is not only active but is >still growing. It has been my policy when I add someone to >the mailing list to send them something like the following >message. In the event that some of you may not have seen it, >or know its contents, I will repeat it here: > > Subject: Welcome to SF-LOVERS! > > You have now been added to the SF-LOVERS mailing > list. An archive of all past messages sent to the list > is kept in the file AI:DUFFEY;_DATA_ SF. Feel free to > peruse it, but please be very careful not to modify it. > > BTW, I am the maintainer of the mailing list. If > you ever have any problems/questions about the list, > please send me some mail rather than everyone. (eg. > if you sent a message to the list and the COMSAT gave > you a cryptic error, etc.) I will then reply directly > to you as needed with a solution/answer. > > Also if you tell someone about SF-LOVERS please > ask them to send their requests to be added directly > to DUFFEY@MIT-AI. > > Enjoy, > > Roger > > The statement in the last paragraph is the key actually. >People asking to be added to SF-LOVERS are not on SF-LOVERS >and will not have seen this message. When you tell someone >about the list you need to remember to tell them to send >their requests directly to me. > There is a problem however, and that is remembering that >"me" is DUFFEY@MIT-AI (and you better not forget the E either). >To avoid this I have installed a new feedername for mail. The >name is SF-LOVERS-REQUEST and all it does is redirect mail to >me. Therefore: > > If you ever have any problems/questions about the list, > please send mail to SF-LOVERS-REQUEST@MIT-AI, rather than > to everyone. Also if you tell someone about SF-LOVERS, > please ask them to send their requests to be added directly > to SF-LOVERS-REQUEST@MIT-AI (or MIT-MC or MIT-ML or MIT-DM). > >For Alan. > > Enjoy, > Roger From list-managers-owner Sun Jan 7 16:44:39 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id QAA19366 for list-managers-outgoing; Sun, 7 Jan 1996 16:35:12 -0800 (PST) Received: from hustle.rahul.net (hustle.rahul.net [192.160.13.2]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id QAA19361 for ; Sun, 7 Jan 1996 16:35:09 -0800 (PST) Received: from LunaCity.UUCP by hustle.rahul.net with UUCP id AA23446 (5.67b8/IDA-1.5 for list-managers@greatcircle.com); Sun, 7 Jan 1996 16:34:13 -0800 Received: by LunaCity.com (1.65/waf) via UUCP; Sun, 07 Jan 96 15:23:38 PST for list-managers@greatcircle.com To: list-managers@greatcircle.com Cc: ala@hustle.rahul.net Subject: Re: How was "-request" coined? From: ala@LunaCity.com (alyson l abramowitz) Message-Id: Date: Sun, 07 Jan 96 15:23:17 PST In-Reply-To: Organization: Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk ala@LunaCity.com (alyson l abramowitz) writes: > Long, long, ago; Far, far away, in the days of the ARPAnet.... > > David asks if anyone remembers how and when the names listname@site > and listname-request@site were created. As an oldster on the list > of an ancient 30something in age, I remember this. > > I believe both terms were created by Roger Duffey. Roger was > an MIT graduate student who tried to keep a science fiction interest > list from overrunning the DEC-10 machine he was using for research. > > I have the printouts I could look up the year in. 1979/80 sounds > about right. I'm not off by more than a year. > > Back in those days, that particular DEC-10 (MIT-AI) and its > sister MIT machines had some interesting mailing software on it > which allowed someone to send to a distribution list name and have > it exploded to all of its members (something few other pieces of > mailing software supported gracefully). > > The list in question threatened to overwhelm MIT-AI. So Roger > bundled up a days worth of messages into a digest. So the > SF-Lover's Digest (and digest lists, in general) were born. > > I believe Roger created the -Request versus the mailing list > convention shortly after he started inventing the Digest. The > original packagings were very primitive and developed over > a (relatively short) period of time to have a complex indexing > system (which only 15 years later we are in a position to take > advantage of now). > > Having a -Request mailbox made it possible to automate much of > the process of physically making a digest once messages were > selected and ordered (tho I don't think Roger actually did > this; others of us did; he was on a funky OS so we couldn't > share software easily). The two streams also allowed for the > potential automation of add/deletes that LISTSERV eventually > provided. > > Although I ran one of the major redistributions of that list, > I never thought to ask Roger why he picked -Request as the > name for administrative requests. He had had a lot of background > in moderating groups. He always contented that he used much of > the same techniques on the digest lists. I don't know. Perhaps > it was just as simple as thinking that people were asking for a > request to be added or removed. > > I find it interesting that people were asking you for parts and > other such questions. When I did my stints as moderator (many > years ago) those kinds of requests never occured. Maybe its > just that the world and the Internet has changed. > > I know one thing I did when I was handling redistribution and > moderating was to educate my list members about how to communicate > and what was acceptable net behavior. Every one of the early > digest lists came with a welcome letter explaining this kind of > stuff (a concept Roger created for the Internet). And when someone > didn't behave appropriately, I would send them a polite message > in my moderator/redistributor role explaining why their behavior > was in violation of net behavior/rules (and sometimes rejecting > a contribution or suggesting revision). > > Well, David, you've got me feeling all nostalgic now. Maybe I'll > get energetic and go reread those old printouts I've lugged from > house to house for years (I still have a copy of the original lists > in TOPS-20 tape format, too!). > > Best, > Alyson > > From list-managers-owner Sun Jan 7 18:29:39 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id SAA20877 for list-managers-outgoing; Sun, 7 Jan 1996 18:16:05 -0800 (PST) Received: from hustle.rahul.net (hustle.rahul.net [192.160.13.2]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id SAA20867 for ; Sun, 7 Jan 1996 18:16:00 -0800 (PST) Received: from LunaCity.UUCP by hustle.rahul.net with UUCP id AA29296 (5.67b8/IDA-1.5 for list-managers@greatcircle.com); Sun, 7 Jan 1996 18:15:10 -0800 Received: by LunaCity.com (1.65/waf) via UUCP; Sun, 07 Jan 96 17:54:49 PST for list-managers@greatcircle.com To: Brent@GreatCircle.COM (Brent Chapman) Cc: list-managers@greatcircle.com Subject: Re: How was "-request" coined? From: ala@LunaCity.com (alyson l abramowitz) Message-Id: Date: Sun, 07 Jan 96 17:48:36 PST In-Reply-To: Organization: Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk There were many lists before Risks, Human-Nets, and SF-Lovers. Only they were small and many were manually done. SF-Lovers was the first huge mailing list on the Internet (then the ARPAnet). I believe Human-Nets came next. There were a number of other lists that came after that: Telecom-Digest and WorkS, come to mind. I believe Risks came much later on the scene. SFL, Human-Nets, and Telecom-Digest were already in operation by 1981. Best, Alyson PS The comment about being able to find the administrator is why Roger created the -Request box. Why he called it that rather than some other name, I don't know.--ala From list-managers-owner Sun Jan 7 22:14:40 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id WAA25328 for list-managers-outgoing; Sun, 7 Jan 1996 22:02:31 -0800 (PST) Received: from taz.hyperreal.com (taz.hyperreal.com [204.62.129.130]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id WAA25319; Sun, 7 Jan 1996 22:02:27 -0800 (PST) Received: by taz.hyperreal.com (8.6.12/8.6.5) id WAA25984; Sun, 7 Jan 1996 22:01:37 -0800 Date: Sun, 7 Jan 1996 22:01:36 -0800 (PST) From: Brian Behlendorf To: Brent Chapman cc: "David W. Tamkin" , list-managers@GreatCircle.COM Subject: Re: How was "-request" coined? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk On Sun, 7 Jan 1996, Brent Chapman wrote: > >Date: 30 DEC 1979 0058-EST > >From: DUFFEY at MIT-AI (Roger D. Duffey, II) > >Subject: I'm in charge! (and with a loooong message too) > >To: SF-LOVERS at MIT-AI ... > > Subject: Welcome to SF-LOVERS! > > > > You have now been added to the SF-LOVERS mailing > > list. An archive of all past messages sent to the list > > is kept in the file AI:DUFFEY;_DATA_ SF. Feel free to > > peruse it, but please be very careful not to modify it. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Ha! Brian From list-managers-owner Mon Jan 8 06:59:41 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id GAA06304 for list-managers-outgoing; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 06:51:58 -0800 (PST) Received: from miso.wwa.com (miso.wwa.com [198.49.174.33]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id GAA06299 for ; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 06:51:53 -0800 (PST) Received: by miso.wwa.com (Smail3.1.29.1 #2) id m0tZIub-000Y4YC; Mon, 8 Jan 96 08:51 CST Message-Id: From: dattier@wwa.com (David W. Tamkin) Subject: Re: How was "-request" coined? To: meo@schoneal.com Date: Mon, 8 Jan 1996 08:51:01 -0600 (CST) Cc: list-managers@greatcircle.com In-Reply-To: <199601072201.QAA25254@schoneal.com> from "Miles O'Neal" at Jan 7, 96 04:01:01 pm X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL23] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Thanks to Alyson Abramowitz and Brent Chapman for their glimpses into the origins of the "-request" suffix. But Miles O'Neal gave me this pat (as in what he did to his own back) answer: | Please add me top the list. | Please remove me from the list. | | Sounds like requests to me... Miles, you missed the point. Try reasoning forward (from the viewpoint of someone who isn't already familiar with the suffix "-request" and is trying to come up with a convention) instead of backward (from the perspective of somebody justifying a choice already made). Yes, a case can be made for "-request," but lots of other choices would have been logical at that point as well, and they would not have had the same problems today (they might have had different ones that -request doesn't have). I wanted to know why, out of all the ideas possible, "-request" got chosen. Why not "-changes" or "-membership"? If either of those had become the standard, and someone asked today how they came about, anyone could say what Miles O'Neal did: "add me, remove me -- those sound like changes to me" or "add me, remove me -- those sound like mail about list membership to me." And it still wouldn't answer the question. Then again, if I had used corolla-changes instead of corolla-request, people would write in thinking I would take their cars in trade, replace their parts, or upgrade their options. With the advantange of hindsight from 1996, I am seriously considering changing the aliases for the list I still run to something grossly obvious like listname-submissions and listname-subscriptions. That won't help for replies, since virtually nobody pays attention to whether his or her MUA picked out the right reply address, but it will for original mailings. listname@site and listname-request@site will still have to be active (if only to return autoreplies that this list breaks convention) because people will assume they exist. David W. Tamkin dattier@wwa.com MCI Mail: 426-1818 From list-managers-owner Mon Jan 8 07:29:41 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id HAA07274 for list-managers-outgoing; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 07:26:50 -0800 (PST) Received: from schoneal.com (wildride.schoneal.com [206.81.38.2]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id HAA07269 for ; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 07:26:43 -0800 (PST) Received: (from meo@localhost) by schoneal.com (8.6.11/8.6.11) id JAA02741; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 09:27:17 -0600 Message-Id: <199601081527.JAA02741@schoneal.com> Subject: Re: How was "-request" coined? To: dattier@wwa.com (David W. Tamkin) Date: Mon, 8 Jan 1996 09:27:16 -0600 (CST) Cc: meo@schoneal.com, list-managers@greatcircle.com In-Reply-To: from "David W. Tamkin" at Jan 8, 96 08:51:01 am From: meo@schoneal.com (Miles O'Neal) Reply-To: meo@schoneal.com (Miles O'Neal) Organization: Schober O'Neal, Inc / Net Ads X-WWW-URL: http://www.schoneal.com/~meo/ X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL24] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk David W. Tamkin said... | |But Miles O'Neal gave me this pat (as in what he did to his own back) answer: Nah. I do occasionally scratch it, tho. || Please add me top the list. || Please remove me from the list. || || Sounds like requests to me... The early net was primarily composed of literate, thoughtful people. Or at least geeks. The -request concept was of, by and for such people. These people usually at least glanced at the instructions, or go the whole rundown from a net-savvy friend. As the net grew, it was made up more and more of people with less and less experience, consideration, intelligence, or whatever (there are plenty of others as well, but this number grew, and so did the percentage). So what was obvious then is counter-intuitive for many netters today. -Miles, you scratch my monitor, I'll pat yours. From list-managers-owner Mon Jan 8 09:06:30 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id IAA09074 for list-managers-outgoing; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 08:31:33 -0800 (PST) Received: from ncar.UCAR.EDU (ncar.ucar.edu [192.52.106.6]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with ESMTP id IAA09069; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 08:31:28 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <199601081630.JAA14872@ncar.ucar.EDU> Received: by ncar.ucar.EDU (NCAR Local/ NCAR Central Post Office 03/11/93) id JAA14872; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 09:30:00 -0700 (MST) Subject: Re: How was "-request" coined? To: ala@LunaCity.com (alyson l abramowitz) Date: Mon, 8 Jan 96 9:29:59 MST Cc: Brent@GreatCircle.COM, list-managers@GreatCircle.COM In-Reply-To: ; from "alyson l abramowitz" at Jan 7, 96 5:48 pm From: woods@ncar.ucar.edu (Greg Woods) X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.3 PL11] Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk > There were many lists before Risks, Human-Nets, and SF-Lovers. > Only they were small and many were manually done. SF-Lovers was > the first huge mailing list on the Internet (then the ARPAnet). > I believe Human-Nets came next. There were a number of other > lists that came after that: Telecom-Digest and WorkS, come to > mind. I believe Risks came much later on the scene. SFL, > Human-Nets, and Telecom-Digest were already in operation by 1981. I believe that these were also the intial set of fa.* newsgroups, the first mailing lists to be gatewayed into USENET newsgroups ("fa" stood for "From ARPAnet"). Back in ancient times when we actually exchanged news over long distance UUCP links :-) Not so ancient, really. The Internet as we know it really got started in 1987 with the advent of NSFnet, when for the first time sites that were not defense contractors could participate in long-haul IP connections. I actually won a special commendation for rearranging our long distance newsfeeds to go over this new network, initially using UUCP-over-TCP and then switching to NNTP which was brand new then, since when I did that our long distance phone bill dropped by $1500/month (which was more than enough for the managers to take notice). So now you have an idea of how much it cost a backbone site to do news in those days. Back to the subject at hand, when I came onto the net in 1981, these fa.* newsgroups already existed. My mail address I would include in postings to those groups was menlo70!hao!woods@BERKELEY, which is how folks on ARPAnet would have addressed me. For the UUCP groups, net.* at the time, it was ucbvax!menlo70!hao!woods; we always had to give our address relative to a well-known site and assume that anyone wanting to reach us would know how to get there. It turns out that my boss at the time, the sysadmin for the "hao" system, had some contacts at Menlo Park, hence we had a UUCP link to menlo70. That's how the net was connected in those days. As for why "-request" was chosen instead of some other suffix that might now be less confusing: I challenge you to come up with anything that won't be confusing to SOMEONE. The truth is, in those days most of the people on the net were fairly computer literate; the "clueless newbie" syndrome simply didn't exist. Roger Duffey was innovative but not clairvoyant. Most likely, it simply never occurred to him that it really mattered what name he chose; he just needed something to serve the function. I also doubt that he really intended to set a standard when he did that; he was just trying to solve an immediate problem with one particular list. --Greg From list-managers-owner Mon Jan 8 09:55:02 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id JAA10649 for list-managers-outgoing; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 09:35:48 -0800 (PST) Received: from gateway.fmp.com (gateway.fmp.com [198.3.116.18]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id JAA10630 for ; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 09:35:40 -0800 (PST) Received: from castle.fmp.com (castle.fmp.com [198.3.116.19]) by gateway.fmp.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) with SMTP id LAA14052 for ; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 11:34:38 -0600 Message-Id: <199601081734.LAA14052@gateway.fmp.com> X-Sender: fmouse@gateway.fmp.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Pro Version 2.1.2 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Mon, 08 Jan 1996 11:34:34 -0600 To: list-managers@greatcircle.com From: Lindsay Haisley Subject: Re: How was "-request" coined? Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Perhaps the most logical choice would have been "-listrequest", but then history has a way of justifying mistakes.... At 08:51 AM 1/8/96 -0600, you wrote: >Yes, a case can be made for "-request," but lots of other choices would have >been logical at that point as well, and they would not have had the same >problems today (they might have had different ones that -request doesn't >have). (______) Lindsay Haisley (oo) "The bull FMP Computer Services /------\/ stops here!" fmouse@fmp.com / | || Austin, Texas, USA * ||---|| * * * * * * (512) 259-1190 ~~ ~~ http://www.fmp.com From list-managers-owner Mon Jan 8 10:34:35 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id KAA11413 for list-managers-outgoing; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 10:05:05 -0800 (PST) Received: from mycroft.GreatCircle.COM (mycroft.greatcircle.com [198.102.244.35]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id KAA11408 for ; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 10:05:02 -0800 (PST) Received: by mycroft.GreatCircle.COM (8.6.10/SMI-4.1/Brent-951213) id KAA06711; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 10:02:18 -0800 Received: from hustle.rahul.net(192.160.13.2) by mycroft via smap (V1.3mjr) id sma006708; Mon Jan 8 10:01:12 1996 Received: from LunaCity.UUCP by hustle.rahul.net with UUCP id AA21796 (5.67b8/IDA-1.5 for list-managers@greatcircle.com); Mon, 8 Jan 1996 10:01:47 -0800 Received: by LunaCity.com (1.65/waf) via UUCP; Mon, 08 Jan 96 09:57:26 PST for list-managers@greatcircle.com To: dattier@wwa.com (David W. Tamkin) Cc: list-managers@greatcircle.com Subject: Re: How was "-request" coined? From: ala@LunaCity.com (alyson l abramowitz) Message-Id: <6iceHD3w165w@LunaCity.com> Date: Mon, 08 Jan 96 09:45:52 PST In-Reply-To: Organization: Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk David, I hope you don't go through with the change you are proposing for a number of reasons. First, by not following convention you make it harder for your subscribers. Second, unless you only handle subscriptions (not special requests, archive requests, mailing problems, etc), the names you propose become confusing in a different manner. Tho I'm reluctant to try to read Roger's mind of more than 15 years ago, the -request address always had functions beyond adds/deletes. So maybe that is why he picked the word: what every message had in common was a request. My suspicion is that the list@site convention came from the already in usage requirement of his software. Roger simply set the list@site address to a file. And, just to mop up a few other related comments from others, the archives for SFL were rarely munged despite the fact that it would have been easy to do so (all you needed to do was to edit the file and save it with some modification: MIT-AI had NO file protection). We also had lots of people coming on to the ARPAnet in the early days that didn't have a clue. Some were even fairly computer illiterate (e.g., admins). The numbers were smaller. When they goofed we took them aside and politely read them the riot act. The large lists were some of the most obvious places where they appeared. Remember, ALL the initial large lists were technically not supposed to exist (the net was for DOD/work traffic only). They were ignored by the Powers That Be only if certain rules (like non-commercialism) happened. A remember spending quite a bit of time explaining that to our readers (all behind the scenes). Best, Alyson dattier@wwa.com (David W. Tamkin) writes: > Thanks to Alyson Abramowitz and Brent Chapman for their glimpses into the > origins of the "-request" suffix. > > But Miles O'Neal gave me this pat (as in what he did to his own back) answer: > > | Please add me top the list. > | Please remove me from the list. > | > | Sounds like requests to me... > > Miles, you missed the point. Try reasoning forward (from the viewpoint of > someone who isn't already familiar with the suffix "-request" and is trying > to come up with a convention) instead of backward (from the perspective of > somebody justifying a choice already made). > > Yes, a case can be made for "-request," but lots of other choices would have > been logical at that point as well, and they would not have had the same > problems today (they might have had different ones that -request doesn't > have). I wanted to know why, out of all the ideas possible, "-request" got > chosen. Why not "-changes" or "-membership"? If either of those had become > the standard, and someone asked today how they came about, anyone could say > what Miles O'Neal did: "add me, remove me -- those sound like changes to me" > or "add me, remove me -- those sound like mail about list membership to me." > And it still wouldn't answer the question. > > Then again, if I had used corolla-changes instead of corolla-request, people > would write in thinking I would take their cars in trade, replace their > parts, or upgrade their options. > > With the advantange of hindsight from 1996, I am seriously considering > changing the aliases for the list I still run to something grossly obvious > like listname-submissions and listname-subscriptions. That won't help for > replies, since virtually nobody pays attention to whether his or her MUA > picked out the right reply address, but it will for original mailings. > listname@site and listname-request@site will still have to be active (if only > to return autoreplies that this list breaks convention) because people will > assume they exist. > > David W. Tamkin dattier@wwa.com MCI Mail: 426-1818 > From list-managers-owner Mon Jan 8 13:29:42 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id NAA16104 for list-managers-outgoing; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 13:03:19 -0800 (PST) Received: from access.netaxs.com (access.netaxs.com [198.69.186.2]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id IAA08760 for ; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 08:13:59 -0800 (PST) Received: from unix2.netaxs.com (jgreshes@unix2.netaxs.com [198.69.186.4]) by access.netaxs.com (8.6.12/8.6.11) with ESMTP id LAA21084 for ; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 11:13:23 -0500 Received: (jgreshes@localhost) by unix2.netaxs.com (8.6.11/8.6.9) id LAA20390; Mon, 8 Jan 1996 11:13:15 -0500 Date: Mon, 8 Jan 1996 11:13:14 -0500 (EST) From: Commercial Suicide cc: list-managers@GreatCircle.COM Subject: Re: How was "-request" coined? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk On Mon, 8 Jan 1996, David W. Tamkin wrote: > chosen. Why not "-changes" or "-membership"? If either of those had become > the standard, and someone asked today how they came about, anyone could say > what Miles O'Neal did: "add me, remove me -- those sound like changes to me" > or "add me, remove me -- those sound like mail about list membership to me." > And it still wouldn't answer the question. > But -request may be the best word to use. On some lists the -request address does all kinds of things: not just add and subtract people, but also serve files, receive files, give help messages, give faqs, etc. About the only thing that would make as much sense would be -admin instead of -request. > Then again, if I had used corolla-changes instead of corolla-request, people > would write in thinking I would take their cars in trade, replace their > parts, or upgrade their options. > > With the advantange of hindsight from 1996, I am seriously considering > changing the aliases for the list I still run to something grossly obvious > like listname-submissions and listname-subscriptions. That won't help for > replies, since virtually nobody pays attention to whether his or her MUA > picked out the right reply address, but it will for original mailings. > listname@site and listname-request@site will still have to be active (if only > to return autoreplies that this list breaks convention) because people will > assume they exist. I hate to break this to you, but there are incredibly stupid people on the net. I like Harlan Ellision's line: "Give an idiot a computer and you get an idiot with a computer." No matter what you change the aliases to, there will still be enough stupid people to annoy you. There is no limit on the number of stupid people. There the one's that can't figure out how to work birth control, so they actually procreate at a far higher rate than intelligent people. We can spend all the time in world debating whether to use this word or that word, but you are never going to make your lists or aliases idiot proof. Jason From list-managers-owner Wed Jan 10 12:42:35 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id LAA05052 for list-managers-outgoing; Wed, 10 Jan 1996 11:30:49 -0800 (PST) Received: from mycroft.GreatCircle.COM (mycroft.greatcircle.com [198.102.244.35]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id LAA04815 for ; Wed, 10 Jan 1996 11:29:26 -0800 (PST) Received: by mycroft.GreatCircle.COM (8.6.10/SMI-4.1/Brent-951213) id FAA23859; Wed, 10 Jan 1996 05:11:24 -0800 Received: from gizmo.lut.ac.uk(158.125.96.46) by mycroft via smap (V1.3mjr) id sma023798; Wed Jan 10 05:07:57 1996 Received: from localhost (martin@localhost) by gizmo.lut.ac.uk (8.7.3/8.6.9) with SMTP id NAA22792; Wed, 10 Jan 1996 13:07:36 GMT Message-Id: <199601101307.NAA22792@gizmo.lut.ac.uk> To: martin@mrrl.lut.ac.uk X-URI: Subject: Possible Hypermail problem and fix Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: multipart/mixed ; boundary="===_0_Wed_Jan_10_12:43:15_GMT_1996" Date: Wed, 10 Jan 1996 13:07:31 +0000 From: Martin Hamilton Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk This is a multipart MIME message. --===_0_Wed_Jan_10_12:43:15_GMT_1996 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Sorry for the cross-posting, but I guess this will interest anyone who uses Hypermail to archive their mailing lists... A subscriber was complaining that his posts weren't being archived, and on investigation I discovered that Hypermail would get confused and fall over if given a "Message-Id:" header which doesn't have the message ID itself enclosed in '<' and '>' So, I just thought I'd pass the message on. I've attached a simple minded (and unofficial) fix for the problem which seems to work for me - your mileage may vary! Cheerio, Martin --===_0_Wed_Jan_10_12:43:15_GMT_1996 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Description: parse.c.patch - be liberal in what you accept! *** parse.c.FCS Wed Jan 10 08:25:50 1996 --- parse.c Wed Jan 10 08:45:37 1996 *************** *** 630,636 **** char *c; static char msgid[MSGDSTRLEN]; ! c = (char *) strchr(line, '<') + 1; for (i = 0; *c && *c != '>' && *c != '\n' && i < MSGDSTRLEN; c++) { if (*c == '\\') continue; --- 630,645 ---- char *c; static char msgid[MSGDSTRLEN]; ! if ((char *)strchr(line, '<') == NULL) { ! /* bozo alert! ! ** msg-id = "<" addr-spec ">" ! ** try to recover as best we can ! */ ! c = (char *) strchr(line, ':') + 1; /* we know this exists! */ ! while (*c && *c == ' ') c++; /* skip spaces before message ID */ ! } else { ! c = (char *) strchr(line, '<') + 1; ! } for (i = 0; *c && *c != '>' && *c != '\n' && i < MSGDSTRLEN; c++) { if (*c == '\\') continue; *************** *** 637,642 **** --- 646,653 ---- msgid[i++] = *c; } msgid[i] = '\0'; + + if (strlen(msgid) == 0) strcpy(msgid, "BOZO"); return msgid; } --===_0_Wed_Jan_10_12:43:15_GMT_1996-- From list-managers-owner Wed Jan 10 13:56:23 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id NAA08890 for list-managers-outgoing; Wed, 10 Jan 1996 13:10:49 -0800 (PST) Received: from miso.wwa.com (miso.wwa.com [198.49.174.33]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id NAA08872 for ; Wed, 10 Jan 1996 13:10:42 -0800 (PST) Received: by miso.wwa.com (Smail3.1.29.1 #2) id m0ta7m3-000YOWC; Wed, 10 Jan 96 15:09 CST Message-Id: From: dattier@wwa.com (David W. Tamkin) Subject: Re: How was "-request" coined? To: list-managers@greatcircle.com Date: Wed, 10 Jan 1996 15:09:34 -0600 (CST) X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL23] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Miles O'Neal wrote, O> The early net was primarily composed of literate, thoughtful people. O> Or at least geeks. The -request concept was of, by and for such people. O> These people usually at least glanced at the instructions, or go the O> whole rundown from a net-savvy friend. Precisely; in 1988, when I first learned about mailing lists, I qualified as thoughtful (I won't lay claim to "literate") and I did read the instructions. And "-request" struck me at the time as just as good as anything else ... if not intuitively obvious, still sensible enough after one learned of it and easy enough to get used to. O> So what was obvious then is counter-intuitive for many netters today. And therein lies the problem: people who are relying on intuition instead of taking the trouble to get the full scoop. They do whatever they guess sounds right (or take someone else's authoritatively proclaimed guess as gospel) and forge ahead. The result of this trial-and-error method is that their errors become our trials. Greg Woods wrote, W> As for why "-request" was chosen instead of some other suffix that W> might now be less confusing: I challenge you to come up with anything W> that won't be confusing to SOMEONE. Indeed; as I have said before -- and even illustrated when I said that if I'd used "corolla-changes" instead of "corolla-request" non-members would write to that address asking for option upgrades -- any choice would have had its drawbacks. W> I also doubt that [Roger Duffey] really intended to set a standard when W> he did that; he was just trying to solve an immediate problem with one W> particular list. But the pebble started rolling down the snowy slope, and the rest is history. jgreshes@netaxs.com (who didn't give a surname but I'll use "G>" to cite him) wrote, immediately after quoting my "corolla-changes" scenario, G> No matter what you change the aliases to, there will still be enough G> stupid people to annoy you. ... We can spend all the time in world G> debating whether to use this word or that word, but you are never going to G> make your lists or aliases idiot proof. Right: that is exactly the point I was making Monday. Jason is rephrasing something I already said. Finally, Alyson Abramowitz recommended strongly that I not change my list's aliases to those I was considering. I'd had similar thoughts myself: if I do change them I won't disable the traditional addresses, because doing that would confuse not only the clueless newbie types but also the net.veterans who know about every mailing list except mine. listname-request@site and listname@site would have to continue working if only to return a short list of the addresses to use instead, because the convention is well established. From list-managers-owner Fri Jan 12 09:44:16 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id JAA24155 for list-managers-outgoing; Fri, 12 Jan 1996 09:37:48 -0800 (PST) Received: from panix3.panix.com (panix3.panix.com [198.7.0.4]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with ESMTP id JAA24150 for ; Fri, 12 Jan 1996 09:37:44 -0800 (PST) Received: (from genie@localhost) by panix3.panix.com (8.7/8.7/PanixU1.3) id MAA00319; Fri, 12 Jan 1996 12:36:48 -0500 (EST) From: Andy Finkenstadt Message-Id: <199601121736.MAA00319@panix3.panix.com> Subject: GEnie Online Service Mail Outage (impact on mailing lists) To: list-managers@greatcircle.com Date: Fri, 12 Jan 1996 12:36:47 -0500 (EST) Cc: isp-admin-list@listserv.aol.com X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL24] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Greetings, The entire GEIS and GENIE mail systems linked to the Internet are currently experiencing difficulty in delivering or receiving internet mail. In the next few hours mail will start to be returned as undeliverable (the timeout period is 1 day right now). Please if you can, avoid defensively unsubscribing users whose mail addresses end in "genie.com" or "*.geis.com" over the next few days. I am working actively with GEIS to fix the problem (an over-configured router) and to implement workarounds to the timeout & delivery problems. Thank you, Andy Finkenstadt GEnie Postmaster (among many other hats) -- "But I don't have a life. I have a program." - "The Doctor" Emergency Medical Holographic Program, USS Voyager Andrew Finkenstadt, Manager of Software Development, The Printing House Also a GEnie Sysop From list-managers-owner Sun Jan 14 04:10:48 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id EAA20017 for list-managers-outgoing; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 04:09:29 -0800 (PST) Received: from oulu.fi (ousrvr.oulu.fi [130.231.240.1]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id EAA20001 for ; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 04:09:19 -0800 (PST) Received: from raita.oulu.fi by oulu.fi (4.1/SMI-4.1) id AA11011; Sun, 14 Jan 96 14:08:21 +0200 Received: from haapa.oulu.fi by raita.oulu.fi via ESMTP (950911.SGI.8.6.12.PATCH825/930416.SGI.AUTO) for id OAA20757; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 14:08:09 +0200 Received: (mhotti@localhost) by haapa.oulu.fi (950911.SGI.8.6.12.PATCH825/8.6.9) id OAA23027; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 14:08:09 +0200 Date: Sun, 14 Jan 1996 14:08:07 +0200 (EET) From: Marko Hotti To: list-managers@greatcircle.com Subject: FREE 1 yr. magazine sub spam - again! :-I Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk On sunday morning I noticed that our two international mailing lists VOCALIST and FINLANDIA had been attacked. This 'FREE 1 yr. magazine subscription' spam occurred several times last year and I had to include extra checks to the MD resend code so that these spams won't get to the relay. So this actually didn't get to the distribution - luckily! :) I have included the headers of this spam here. I have also sent notes to several roots on the hosts appearing in the headers but I think some of them have no idea of what's going on. Marko Hotti System Administrator of lists.oulu.fi University of Oulu, FINLAND >From jennie@uni.liverpool.ac.ukSun Jan 14 13:49:04 1996 >Received: from franklin.seas.gwu.edu by phoenix.oulu.fi; (5.65/1.1.8.2/29Aug94-8.2MPM) id AA29180; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 03:32:17 +0200 >Received: from [198.70.174.245] (chi-pm2-21.freeppp.com [198.70.174.245]) by franklin.seas.gwu.edu (8.7.1/8.7.1) with SMTP id TAA22800; Sat, 13 Jan 1996 19:25:40 -0500 (EST) >X-Sender: jennie@uni.liverpool.ac.uk (Unverified) >Message-Id: >Mime-Version: 1.0 >Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Reply-To: please.reply.via.fax.or.via.smail@fax.number.or.smail.address.shown.below >Approved: moderator >Date: Sat, 13 Jan 1996 19:31:20 -0500 >To: jennie@uni.liverpool.ac.uk >From: jennie@uni.liverpool.ac.uk, steinling@rentwes.org.uk, chiu@otego.ac.uk, ronnie@jhg.co.uk, ellen@tci.co.uk, samuels@uni.london.ac.uk, chen@birmingham.org.uk, chi@manchester.co.uk, wind@rfg1.co.uk, susans@uni.rhodes.ac.uk, gregor@southampt.n.org.uk, ellen@plymouth.ac.uk, gfos@fresno.co.uk, trens@uni.london.ac.uk, jim@uni.london.ac.uk, fharile@plymouth.org.uk, relson@childs.co.uk, nels@hall.co.uk, sarap@ruv4.co.uk, gspelling@earthlite.co.uk (Association of International Students, Executive Board of Directors, UK Chapter) Subject: ===>> FREE 1 yr. Magazine Sub sent worldwide- 295+ Popular USA Titles -----> NOTE: Please first read my note which appears below the "Request for more info Form." Then, to get more info, just fill out the "Request for More Info" form completely and *FAX* or *SMAIL* it back to the company. You will get a quick reply via email within 1 business day of receipt of the info request form below. From list-managers-owner Sun Jan 14 04:40:46 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id EAA22509 for list-managers-outgoing; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 04:34:45 -0800 (PST) Received: from sacusr.mp.usbr.gov ([140.214.12.2]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id EAA22504 for ; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 04:34:41 -0800 (PST) Received: by sacto.mp.usbr.gov (MX V4.2 VAX) id 201; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 04:32:05 PST Date: Sun, 14 Jan 1996 04:32:02 PST From: "Henry W. Miller" To: mhotti@raita.oulu.fi CC: list-managers@greatcircle.com, henrym@sacto.mp.usbr.gov Message-ID: <0099C5C1.B6F79338.201@sacto.mp.usbr.gov> Subject: RE: FREE 1 yr. magazine sub spam - again! :-I Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk > From: MX%"mhotti@raita.oulu.fi" 14-JAN-1996 04:14:31.75 > Subj: FREE 1 yr. magazine sub spam - again! :-I > > On sunday morning I noticed that our two international mailing lists > VOCALIST and FINLANDIA had been attacked. This 'FREE 1 yr. magazine > subscription' spam occurred several times last year and I had to include > extra checks to the MD resend code so that these spams won't get to the > relay. So this actually didn't get to the distribution - luckily! :) > > I have included the headers of this spam here. I have also sent notes to > several roots on the hosts appearing in the headers but I think some of > them have no idea of what's going on. > > Marko Hotti > System Administrator of lists.oulu.fi > University of Oulu, FINLAND > > >From jennie@uni.liverpool.ac.ukSun Jan 14 13:49:04 1996 A fake return address as usual. It also hit, besides this group, COM-PRIV, WAIS-TALK, INFO-VAX & TCP-IP, the latter of which I manage. Fortunately, I saw it hit and killed it before too many copies got out. The last time this spam occured, I FAXed the son-of-a-biscuit-eater and warned him that I would bring charges against him if he ever hit my system again. I would have liked to have thought that my warning scared him off, but NOOOO!!! OK, tomorrow I email the administrators at GWU, FREEPPP (this is not the first time they've been used as a portal) and SPRINTLINK, who is the ISP for FREEPPP. Monday, I'm sending a copy of this to the Postal Inspector for the Staten Island area. I'm really getting fed up with this. > >Received: from franklin.seas.gwu.edu by phoenix.oulu.fi; > (5.65/1.1.8.2/29Aug94-8.2MPM) > id AA29180; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 03:32:17 +0200 > >Received: from [198.70.174.245] (chi-pm2-21.freeppp.com > [198.70.174.245]) by franklin.seas.gwu.edu (8.7.1/8.7.1) with SMTP id TAA22800; Sat, 13 Jan 1996 19:25:40 -0500 (EST) > >X-Sender: jennie@uni.liverpool.ac.uk (Unverified) > >Message-Id: > >Mime-Version: 1.0 > >Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > >Reply-To: > please.reply.via.fax.or.via.smail@fax.number.or.smail.address.shown.below > >Approved: moderator > >Date: Sat, 13 Jan 1996 19:31:20 -0500 > >To: jennie@uni.liverpool.ac.uk > >From: jennie@uni.liverpool.ac.uk, steinling@rentwes.org.uk, > chiu@otego.ac.uk, > ronnie@jhg.co.uk, ellen@tci.co.uk, samuels@uni.london.ac.uk, > chen@birmingham.org.uk, chi@manchester.co.uk, wind@rfg1.co.uk, > susans@uni.rhodes.ac.uk, gregor@southampt.n.org.uk, > ellen@plymouth.ac.uk, gfos@fresno.co.uk, trens@uni.london.ac.uk, > jim@uni.london.ac.uk, fharile@plymouth.org.uk, relson@childs.co.uk, > nels@hall.co.uk, sarap@ruv4.co.uk, > gspelling@earthlite.co.uk (Association of > International Students, Executive Board of Directors, UK Chapter) > Subject: ===>> FREE 1 yr. Magazine Sub sent worldwide- 295+ Popular USA Titles > > -----> NOTE: Please first read my note which appears below the "Request > for more info Form." Then, to get more info, just fill out the "Request > for More Info" form completely and *FAX* or *SMAIL* it back to the company. > You will get a quick reply via email within 1 business day of receipt of > the info request form below. > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Return-Path: > Received: from relay3.UU.NET by sacusr.mp.usbr.gov (MX V4.2 VAX) with SMTP; > Sun, 14 Jan 1996 04:13:50 PST > Received: from miles.greatcircle.com by relay3.UU.NET with ESMTP id > QQzyma13443; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 07:12:16 -0500 (EST) > Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com > (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id EAA20017 for list-managers-outgoing; > Sun, 14 Jan 1996 04:09:29 -0800 (PST) > Received: from oulu.fi (ousrvr.oulu.fi [130.231.240.1]) by > miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id EAA20001 > for ; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 04:09:19 -0800 > (PST) > Received: from raita.oulu.fi by oulu.fi (4.1/SMI-4.1) id AA11011; Sun, 14 Jan > 96 14:08:21 +0200 > Received: from haapa.oulu.fi by raita.oulu.fi via ESMTP > (950911.SGI.8.6.12.PATCH825/930416.SGI.AUTO) for > id OAA20757; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 > 14:08:09 +0200 > Received: (mhotti@localhost) by haapa.oulu.fi > (950911.SGI.8.6.12.PATCH825/8.6.9) id OAA23027; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 > 14:08:09 +0200 > Date: Sun, 14 Jan 1996 14:08:07 +0200 (EET) > From: Marko Hotti > To: list-managers@greatcircle.com > Subject: FREE 1 yr. magazine sub spam - again! :-I > Message-ID: > MIME-Version: 1.0 > Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII > Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM > Precedence: bulk From list-managers-owner Sun Jan 14 14:55:46 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id OAA23500 for list-managers-outgoing; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 14:48:55 -0800 (PST) Received: from svcs1.digex.net (svcs1.digex.net [204.91.197.224]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id OAA23495 for ; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 14:48:52 -0800 (PST) Received: from jjflash.digex.net (dyn000138.belt.digex.net [206.181.16.138]) by svcs1.digex.net (8.6.12/8.6.12) with SMTP id RAA04911; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 17:47:37 -0500 Message-Id: <2.2.32.19960114224626.006c392c@access.digex.net> X-Sender: jjflash@access.digex.net X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Pro Version 2.2 (32) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Sun, 14 Jan 1996 17:46:26 -0500 To: "Henry W. Miller" From: Jack Subject: RE: FREE 1 yr. magazine sub spam - again! :-I Cc: list-managers@GreatCircle.COM Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Hi - I just wanted to add my voice to those list managers who got this spam. Fortunately, the one to my list got bounced to me and I haven't yet decided what to do with it. At 04:32 AM 1/14/96 PST, Henry W. Miller wrote: >> From: MX%"mhotti@raita.oulu.fi" 14-JAN-1996 04:14:31.75 >> Subj: FREE 1 yr. magazine sub spam - again! :-I > >> >> On sunday morning I noticed that our two international mailing lists >> VOCALIST and FINLANDIA had been attacked. This 'FREE 1 yr. magazine >> subscription' spam occurred several times last year and I had to include >> extra checks to the MD resend code so that these spams won't get to the >> relay. So this actually didn't get to the distribution - luckily! :) Take care, Jack ********************************************** jjflash@pobox.com ********************************************** http://www.pobox.com/~jjflash ********************************************** "If I am not for myself, who will be for me? If I am only for myself, what am I? If not now, when?" - Hillel ********************************************** From list-managers-owner Sun Jan 14 15:25:48 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id PAA25217 for list-managers-outgoing; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 15:11:28 -0800 (PST) Received: from apollo.COSC.GOV (apollo.COSC.GOV [198.94.103.34]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with ESMTP id PAA25210 for ; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 15:11:25 -0800 (PST) Received: (from vince@localhost) by apollo.COSC.GOV (8.7.3/8.6.9) id PAA11127; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 15:10:23 -0800 (PST) Date: Sun, 14 Jan 1996 15:10:22 -0800 (PST) From: -Vince- To: Jack cc: "Henry W. Miller" , list-managers@GreatCircle.COM Subject: RE: FREE 1 yr. magazine sub spam - again! :-I In-Reply-To: <2.2.32.19960114224626.006c392c@access.digex.net> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk On Sun, 14 Jan 1996, Jack wrote: Hi everyone, > I just wanted to add my voice to those list managers who got this spam. > Fortunately, the one to my list got bounced to me and I haven't yet decided > what to do with it. Same thing here as well, it got bounced since they put Approved: in the header with moderator as the password so I just deleted it... It happened like once a month or something. Cheers, -Vince- vince@COSC.GOV - GUS Mailing Lists Admin - http://www.COSC.GOV/~vince UC Berkeley AstroPhysics - Electrical Engineering (Honorary B.S.) Chabot Observatory & Science Center - Board of Advisors Running FreeBSD - Real UN*X for Free! Linda Wong/Vivian Chow/Hacken Lee/Danny Chan/Priscilla Chan Fan Club Mailing Lists Admin > At 04:32 AM 1/14/96 PST, Henry W. Miller wrote: > > > >> From: MX%"mhotti@raita.oulu.fi" 14-JAN-1996 04:14:31.75 > >> Subj: FREE 1 yr. magazine sub spam - again! :-I > > > >> > >> On sunday morning I noticed that our two international mailing lists > >> VOCALIST and FINLANDIA had been attacked. This 'FREE 1 yr. magazine > >> subscription' spam occurred several times last year and I had to include > >> extra checks to the MD resend code so that these spams won't get to the > >> relay. So this actually didn't get to the distribution - luckily! :) > > Take care, > Jack > ********************************************** > jjflash@pobox.com > ********************************************** > http://www.pobox.com/~jjflash > ********************************************** > "If I am not for myself, who will be for me? > If I am only for myself, what am I? > If not now, when?" > - Hillel > ********************************************** > > From list-managers-owner Mon Jan 15 11:25:51 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id LAA19264 for list-managers-outgoing; Mon, 15 Jan 1996 11:11:28 -0800 (PST) Received: from rw.realworks.com (rw.realworks.com [204.215.48.2]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id LAA19258 for ; Mon, 15 Jan 1996 11:11:23 -0800 (PST) Received: from chipmunk (rschrock.realworks.com [204.215.48.22]) by rw.realworks.com (8.6.9/8.6.9) with SMTP id NAA00970 for ; Mon, 15 Jan 1996 13:15:04 -0600 Date: Mon, 15 Jan 1996 13:15:04 -0600 Message-Id: <199601151915.NAA00970@rw.realworks.com> X-Sender: rschrock@realworks.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.2 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: list-managers@greatcircle.com From: Randy Schrock Subject: The "WHO" command Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk I and running a new installation of Majordomo v1.93. Everything is working well. I have a quick questions: Is there a way of running an moderate=no, subscribe_policy=open list and limiting the ability of the "WHO" command? I have the private_* parameters set to yes. Thanks in advance. Randy Schrock - rschrock@realworks.com - http://www.realworks.com/schrock President, Schrock & Associates, Inc. - Westwood, KS - (913) 432-8880 From list-managers-owner Tue Jan 16 07:55:54 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id HAA25789 for list-managers-outgoing; Tue, 16 Jan 1996 07:55:44 -0800 (PST) Received: from liverbird.liverpool.ac.uk (livbird.liv.ac.uk [138.253.31.12]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with ESMTP id HAA25774 for ; Tue, 16 Jan 1996 07:55:25 -0800 (PST) Received: from liverbird.liverpool.ac.uk by liverbird.liverpool.ac.uk via Local channel id <20321-0@liverbird.liverpool.ac.uk>; Tue, 16 Jan 1996 15:53:05 +0000 Subject: Re: FREE 1 yr. magazine sub spam - again! :-I To: henrym@sacto.mp.usbr.gov (Henry W. Miller) Date: Tue, 16 Jan 1996 15:53:03 +0000 (GMT) Cc: mhotti@raita.oulu.fi, list-managers@greatcircle.com, henrym@sacto.mp.usbr.gov In-Reply-To: <0099C5C1.B6F79338.201@sacto.mp.usbr.gov> from "Henry W. Miller" at Jan 14, 96 04:32:02 am X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL24 ME7] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit From: Alan Thew Message-ID: <"liverbird.li:203230:960116155308"@liverbird.liverpool.ac.uk> Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk In the last mail, Henry W. Miller wrote: > > > From: MX%"mhotti@raita.oulu.fi" 14-JAN-1996 04:14:31.75 > > Subj: FREE 1 yr. magazine sub spam - again! :-I > > > > > On sunday morning I noticed that our two international mailing lists > > VOCALIST and FINLANDIA had been attacked. This 'FREE 1 yr. magazine > > subscription' spam occurred several times last year and I had to include > > extra checks to the MD resend code so that these spams won't get to the > > relay. So this actually didn't get to the distribution - luckily! :) > > > > I have included the headers of this spam here. I have also sent notes to > > several roots on the hosts appearing in the headers but I think some of > > them have no idea of what's going on. > > .... > > OK, tomorrow I email the administrators at GWU, FREEPPP (this is > not the first time they've been used as a portal) and SPRINTLINK, who is > the ISP for FREEPPP. Glad that some people actually realised that nobody and the University of Liverpool was responsible. Don't people ever look at headers? (no need to answer... ) > > Monday, I'm sending a copy of this to the Postal Inspector for the > Staten Island area. > > I'm really getting fed up with this. > > > >Received: from franklin.seas.gwu.edu by phoenix.oulu.fi; > > (5.65/1.1.8.2/29Aug94-8.2MPM) > > id AA29180; Sun, 14 Jan 1996 03:32:17 +0200 > > >Received: from [198.70.174.245] (chi-pm2-21.freeppp.com > > [198.70.174.245]) by franklin.seas.gwu.edu (8.7.1/8.7.1) with SMTP id TAA22800; Sat, 13 Jan 1996 19:25:40 -0500 (EST) > > >X-Sender: jennie@uni.liverpool.ac.uk (Unverified) > > >Message-Id: > > >Mime-Version: 1.0 > > >Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" > > >Reply-To: > > please.reply.via.fax.or.via.smail@fax.number.or.smail.address.shown.below > > >Approved: moderator > > >Date: Sat, 13 Jan 1996 19:31:20 -0500 > > >To: jennie@uni.liverpool.ac.uk > > >From: jennie@uni.liverpool.ac.uk, steinling@rentwes.org.uk, > -- Alan Thew alan.thew@liv.ac.uk ...!uknet!liv!alan.thew Tel: +44 151 794-4497 University of Liverpool, Computing Services Fax: +44 151 794-4442 From list-managers-owner Tue Jan 16 09:40:54 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id JAA00709 for list-managers-outgoing; Tue, 16 Jan 1996 09:39:14 -0800 (PST) Received: from gateway.fmp.com (gateway.fmp.com [198.3.116.18]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id JAA00695 for ; Tue, 16 Jan 1996 09:39:06 -0800 (PST) Received: from castle.fmp.com (castle.fmp.com [198.3.116.19]) by gateway.fmp.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) with SMTP id LAA21038 for ; Tue, 16 Jan 1996 11:37:47 -0600 Message-Id: <199601161737.LAA21038@gateway.fmp.com> X-Sender: fmouse@gateway.fmp.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Pro Version 2.1.2 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Tue, 16 Jan 1996 11:38:27 -0600 To: list-managers@greatcircle.com From: Lindsay Haisley Subject: RE: FREE 1 yr. magazine sub spam - again! :-I Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk > > OK, tomorrow I email the administrators at GWU, FREEPPP (this is >not the first time they've been used as a portal) and SPRINTLINK, who is >the ISP for FREEPPP. It may or may not be relevant, but I received a personal spam today which also bore a transmission header supplied by freeppp.com. I'm appending the headers from this below for the information of anyone who may be able to use the information. >X-POP3-Rcpt: fmouse@gateway >Return-Path: rofli@ibm.net >Received: from slip-1.slip.net (slip-1.slip.net [204.160.88.10]) by gateway.fmp.com (8.6.12/8.6.12) with ESMTP id JAA20088 for ; Tue, 16 Jan 1996 09:01:16 -0600 >From: rofli@ibm.net >Received: from [198.70.174.208] (chi-pm4-14.freeppp.com [198.70.174.208]) by slip-1.slip.net (8.6.9/8.6.9) with SMTP id FAA25721; Tue, 16 Jan 1996 05:14:04 -0800 >X-Sender: injured@ixc.net (Unverified) >Message-Id: >Mime-Version: 1.0 >Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" >Date: Tue, 16 Jan 1996 06:45:00 +0130 >To: (Recipient list suppressed) >Subject: "Dead Doctors Don't Lie" > >*************************** New Vision International**************************** > > I HATE TO SELL, I HATE TO RECRUIT, I HATE MEETINGS AND 1 ON 1 > PRESENTATIONS; > >But I found a way to get rich in NETWORK MARKETING >and now I'm ready to reveal the simple secret to you: > > "DEAD DOCTORS DON'T LIE" > >This amazing audio tape is the best sponsoring tool I have ever seen. >In my first month I sponsored 110 people and in 10 weeks my group >grew to 749. NO MEETINGS, NO 1 ON 1 PRESENTATIONS, NO RECRUITING >PHONE CALLS, AND NO SELLING. All I have done is mail the tape to >people and let it do all of the work. >blah, blah, blah, etc.... (______) Lindsay Haisley (oo) "The bull FMP Computer Services /------\/ stops here!" fmouse@fmp.com / | || Austin, Texas, USA * ||---|| * * * * * * (512) 259-1190 ~~ ~~ http://www.fmp.com From list-managers-owner Tue Jan 16 12:40:53 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id MAA08042 for list-managers-outgoing; Tue, 16 Jan 1996 12:13:43 -0800 (PST) Received: from utep.el.utwente.nl (utep.el.utwente.nl [130.89.30.10]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id MAA08018 for ; Tue, 16 Jan 1996 12:13:33 -0800 (PST) Received: from scin1.el.utwente.nl by utep.el.utwente.nl with SMTP id AA14910 (5.65c/IDA-1.4.4 for ); Tue, 16 Jan 1996 21:03:43 +0100 Received: from SCINTILLA_RULES/SpoolDir by scin1.el.utwente.nl (Mercury 1.21); 16 Jan 96 21:10:33 +0100 Received: from SpoolDir by SCINTILLA_RULES (Mercury 1.21); 16 Jan 96 21:10:09 +0100 From: "Fred van Dijk" Organization: EE Study Association 'Scintilla' To: list-managers@greatcircle.com Date: Tue, 16 Jan 1996 21:10:00 +0100 Subject: Errors-To: header with mailinglists? Reply-To: f.vandijk@scintilla.utwente.nl X-Mailer: Pegasus Mail v3.22 Message-Id: <54BB8AF63DE@scin1.el.utwente.nl> Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Hello, I've been reading the messages on this newsgroup for a while and have finally reached the level of complete despair, giving me the strenght to send this question :-) I'm the manager of a list with +/- 200 members. This amount of subscribers implies that there are always a few address incorrect, not reachable, server down, full mailbox, etc. This is normal. In every message there is an errors-to header which sends reports of these failures to me. For some obscure reason some of these failure-messages are not always sent to me only, but to the original sender of the message too! And the original sender of the message hasn't got the smallest clue what has happened and asks me what's going wrong. I am subscribed to several mailing-lists and they never send me these error-messages, so my question is: how do you do that? Is there someone who has had the same experience or knows the cause of this? Greetings, Fred van Dijk From list-managers-owner Wed Jan 17 02:56:24 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id CAA08534 for list-managers-outgoing; Wed, 17 Jan 1996 02:41:46 -0800 (PST) Received: from felix.dircon.co.uk (felix.dircon.co.uk [193.128.224.10]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id CAA08503 for ; Wed, 17 Jan 1996 02:41:26 -0800 (PST) Received: by felix.dircon.co.uk id AA04022 (5.67b/IDA-1.5 for ); Wed, 17 Jan 1996 10:39:42 GMT Received: from diversity.org.uk(193.128.226.199) by amnesiac via smap (V1.3) id sma003993; Wed Jan 17 10:39:16 1996 From: nigel@stonewall.demon.co.uk Subject: Re: Errors-To: header with mailinglists? Organization: Digital Diversity Date: Wed, 17 Jan 1996 10:33:53 GMT Message-Id: References: <54BB8AF63DE@scin1.el.utwente.nl> To: list-managers@stonewall.demon.co.uk Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk In article <54BB8AF63DE@scin1.el.utwente.nl> FRED@scintilla.utwente.nl (Fred van Dijk) writes: >For some obscure reason some of these failure-messages are not always sent >to me only, but to the original sender of the message too! And the original >sender of the message hasn't got the smallest clue what has happened and >asks me what's going wrong. > >I am subscribed to several mailing-lists and they never send me these >error-messages, so my question is: how do you do that? The problem stems from a huge number of different mailers, all around the world, that handle errors in different ways. The correct way for errors to be handled on the Internet should be for them to be sent back to the address in the envelope (which will also usually appear in the From line at the start of the headers). You can't always set this in your mailer; it'll depend on how your system is set up. The way that I currently ensure the correct address is present, regardless of the mail system being used, it to use a script on my list software that initiates an SMTP chat with the local host for the messages. (It also sorts addresses according to a specified domain list, allowing slow addresses to have their own copy of the message in the queue). In a real world, that would be sufficient. But there are some systems that ignore the envelope address (especially gateways, which seem to have a problem; I had a lot of hassle with various home-spun JANet systems, too). Errors-To: is recognised by some of these. And some others will use the Reply-To: address, so you could set that to the list admin address (but there are equally good reasons not to). The busiest list I run is a lesbian and gay one, where we try not to disclose the membership. These bounces (and there are ways, some rather crude, of forcing them) will often reveal the presence of someone on the list who may not be out, or want their membership know. So, I've done quite a lot of fiddling over the years to try and ensure that it's not possible to find out who's on the list. It doesn't support commands like 'who,' strips out Acknowledge-To and Return-Receipt-To headers, inserts an Errors-To for the list admin address, has the list-admin address in the envelope, and sets Reply-To to the list, which filters out postings from non members. Unfortunately, there are still mailers out there that will send errors back to the From: address, in spite of all that. For most lists, that's probably not a significant enough number to worry about. In this particular case, there's some rather more substantial header re-writing that turns headers like this: >From nigel@diversity.org.uk To: uk-motss@dircon.co.uk From: nigel@diversity.org.uk (Nigel Whitfield) into this: >From uk-motss-request@dircon.co.uk To: Multiple recipients of list X-Original-From: nigel@diversity.org.uk (Nigel Whitfield) From: UKM-Nigel Whitfield Reply-To: uk-motss@dircon.co.uk Errors-To: uk-motss-request@dircon.co.uk I'm well aware that there are people who will think that utterly horrible, and I wouldn't recommend it for many lists, but if you consider it important that there be no errors sent back to members, for whatever reason, then it's probably about the only way to reliably take account of all the broken mailers out there. Nigel. -- Nigel Whitfield nigel@diversity.org.uk Digital Diversity nigel@stonewall.demon.co.uk and uk-motss ***** All demon.co.uk sites are independently run internet hosts ***** From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 18 06:42:13 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id FAA21075 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 18 Jan 1996 05:56:52 -0800 (PST) Received: from mycroft.GreatCircle.COM (mycroft.greatcircle.com [198.102.244.35]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id FAA20810 for ; Thu, 18 Jan 1996 05:55:58 -0800 (PST) Received: by mycroft.GreatCircle.COM (8.6.10/SMI-4.1/Brent-951213) id WAA07336; Wed, 17 Jan 1996 22:40:39 -0800 Received: from wilma.cs.utk.edu(128.169.94.141) by mycroft via smap (V1.3mjr) id sma007285; Wed Jan 17 22:39:37 1996 Received: from LOCALHOST by wilma.cs.utk.edu with SMTP (cf v2.11c-UTK) id BAA03327; Thu, 18 Jan 1996 01:41:24 -0500 Message-Id: <199601180641.BAA03327@wilma.cs.utk.edu> X-URI: http://www.cs.utk.edu/~moore/ From: Keith Moore To: f.vandijk@scintilla.utwente.nl cc: list-managers@greatcircle.com, moore@cs.utk.edu Subject: Re: Errors-To: header with mailinglists? In-reply-to: Your message of "Tue, 16 Jan 1996 21:10:00 +0100." <54BB8AF63DE@scin1.el.utwente.nl> Date: Thu, 18 Jan 1996 01:41:16 -0500 Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk > I am subscribed to several mailing-lists and they never send me these > error-messages, so my question is: how do you do that? First of all: Errors-To should never be used in outgoing mail, and it should never be honored by any MTA. Errors-To is not a standard header. MTAs should *always* send error messages to the envelope return address, which appears in the MAIL FROM command of the SMTP envelope, or if not in SMTP, in the Return-Path header. Every MTA that I know of that supports Errors-to also does things the right way if Errors-To is not present, so it's arguably better to leave Errors-to out of the message. What's more, the presence of multiple possible error reporting addresses makes for ambiguous handling at best (where does the message go if there is a choice?). (and no, setting them all to point to the same place doesn't always work because there's a possibility that list down stream will rewrite one of them and not the other.) Second: if you run a list, the way you get bounces to go to the list maintainer is to set the envelope return path (SMTP MAIL FROM) to point to the address of the list maintainer. This isn't done by adding a message header. If the list sends mail using sendmail, the -f command-line option can be used to set the envelope return path. Third: many mailers and gateways are broken in that they return mail to the header From address instead of the envelope return address. Some lists set the From address on outgoing mail to point to the list (a very ugly thing to do IMHO), and try to filter error messages to keep them from being sent back to the list. I've seen disasterous results from this approach, either because the list filtered out perfectly valid messages, or because the list let some slip through. Some lists do this better than others, but fortunately, most lists just set the envelope return address to the right place and leave the From header alone. What this generally means is that the list maintainer gets bounces from mailers that work, and the submitter of a message gets bounces from broken mailers. (but at least they don't go to the whole list) Keith Moore From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 18 11:42:11 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id LAA18172 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 18 Jan 1996 11:27:41 -0800 (PST) Received: from sgi.sgi.com (SGI.COM [192.48.153.1]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id LAA16928 for ; Thu, 18 Jan 1996 11:14:25 -0800 (PST) Received: from lunch.engr.sgi.com by sgi.sgi.com via ESMTP (950405.SGI.8.6.12/910110.SGI) for <@sgi.sgi.com:list-managers@greatcircle.com> id LAA09957; Thu, 18 Jan 1996 11:13:30 -0800 Received: by lunch.engr.sgi.com (950511.SGI.8.6.12.PATCH526/940406.SGI.AUTO) for list-managers@greatcircle.com id LAA03028; Thu, 18 Jan 1996 11:13:27 -0800 From: close@lunch.engr.sgi.com (Diane Barlow Close) Message-Id: <199601181913.LAA03028@lunch.engr.sgi.com> Subject: What to do about magazines and books? To: list-managers@greatcircle.com Date: Thu, 18 Jan 1996 11:13:26 -0800 (PST) X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.5 PL0a8s] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk I run several private mailing lists and have had the great misfortune to have them "mentioned" in a dozen national magazines and several books over the past two years. None of the magazines or their reporters or any editor has EVER contacted me before printing the "information" on my lists. ALL have provided incorrect information about my lists. This includes, in four cases, a non-existant "home address" for me, so readers could write to me for more information -- even though I have no further information I can provide by regular mail. Even Internet World, who should know better, printed information about my lists without ever asking me if I wanted the info printed, or ever checking with me to see if the information they had was correct. It was not. They printed an incorrect address for two of my lists that was over two years out of date! Every single time my lists have been mentioned, always incorrectly, my site has been flooded with angry letters to the postmaster demanding to know where my list(s) is and expressing frustration over their not being able to subscribe using the bad directions published in the book or magazine. I have never, ever asked or wanted to be published in any magazine or book. My lists run by the good graces of my host site with the condition that I am no burden to their system. Now that magazines and books are publishing false information, without ever checking with me, the mailing list owner, I have been forced to consider closing subscriptions or even the lists themselves, to limit further harrassement of my postmaster and myself. Far too much "busy work" and damage has been done by the bad information circulating about something that's my private, personal, volunteer hobby. What can be done about stopping this flood of bad information circulating without any checks ever being done? Is it a hopeless task? What happened to journalistic ethics and lessons on source checking? To me this is far more damaging than any spamming anyone could do to my lists. -- Diane Close I'm at lunch all day. :-) If a Canadian Had Said It First (The Globe & Mail): "Cry havoc, and let loose the dogs of a peacekeeping mission!" From list-managers-owner Thu Jan 18 12:47:18 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id MAA19857 for list-managers-outgoing; Thu, 18 Jan 1996 12:17:21 -0800 (PST) Received: from sgi.sgi.com (SGI.COM [192.48.153.1]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8From list-managers-owner Fri Jan 19 15:54:10 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id PAA27354 for list-managers-outgoing; Fri, 19 Jan 1996 15:45:52 -0800 (PST) Received: from hera.cuci.nl (hera.cuci.nl [194.183.100.1]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with ESMTP id PAA27347 for ; Fri, 19 Jan 1996 15:45:46 -0800 (PST) Received: (from srb@localhost) by hera.cuci.nl (8.7.3/BuGless_1.02) id AAA09592; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 00:44:00 +0100 Message-Id: <199601192344.AAA09592@hera.cuci.nl> From: srb@cuci.nl (Stephen R. van den Berg) Date: Sat, 20 Jan 1996 00:43:58 +0100 In-Reply-To: "David Johnson (Exchange)"'s message as of 1996 Jan 19 Fri 11:19. To: "David Johnson (Exchange)" , "'list-managers@greatcircle.com'" Subject: Re: Automated replies and mailing lists Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk "David Johnson (Exchange)" wrote: >I am working with some software that can generate automated replies to >messages users receive. Currently, the software sends these replies to the >address in the Reply-To 822 header if present; otherwise the From header. I'd say, always use the Return-path (AKA From_) information in your case then. However, there are some things you can do to prevent replying to lists (several clues in the header of the incoming mail can reveal a mailinglist). Also, a widely used practice in autoresponders that use procmail/formail is to add: X-Loop: your@own.mail.address to your outgoing header. Also, *preserve* any existing X-Loop: fields that were present on the incoming mail. Now, before you generate the autoreply, check if "X-Loop: your@own.mail.address" was already part of the header of the incoming mail. Even in the odd case that you'd miss some kind of mailinglist or other alias, having the X-Loop: field in there is kind of a last minute insurance to prevent infinite loops (it's not foolproof, but better than nothing). If the autoreplies do not need to be replied to at all, then make sure you set your return-path to <> before sending of the autoreply. -- Sincerely, srb@cuci.nl Stephen R. van den Berg (AKA BuGless). This is a day for firm decisions! Or is it? From list-managers-owner Fri Jan 19 17:09:10 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id QAA00307 for list-managers-outgoing; Fri, 19 Jan 1996 16:52:38 -0800 (PST) Received: from maki.wwa.com (maki.wwa.com [198.49.174.21]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id QAA00302 for ; Fri, 19 Jan 1996 16:52:23 -0800 (PST) Received: from miso.wwa.com by maki.wwa.com with smtp (Smail3.1.29.1 #3) id m0tdRWS-000rLoC; Fri, 19 Jan 96 18:51 CST Received: by miso.wwa.com (Smail3.1.29.1 #2) id m0tdRWR-000YNNC; Fri, 19 Jan 96 18:51 CST Message-Id: From: dattier@wwa.com (David W. Tamkin) Subject: Re: Automated replies and mailing lists To: djohnson@wspu.MICROSOFT.com (David Johnson) Date: Fri, 19 Jan 1996 18:51:11 -0600 (CST) Cc: list-managers@greatcircle.com In-Reply-To: from "David Johnson" at Jan 19, 96 11:19:38 am X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.4 PL23] MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk David Johnson wrote, | (The best solution might be to not | send the automated replies at all, but that is not an option at this point.) Well, move to the next point so that it can be an option. Why do you want to send automated replies to items that your users receive from mailing lists? Generally autoresponders for people who belong to mailing lists should NOT to reply to mail from those lists. If any of the lists I have run had a member whose site sent back any kind of receipt to every item from the list, I'd ask that member to prevent it, and if the member could not or would not, I'd take him or her off, requesting that he or she find email access somewhere else. I regularly do disable subscriptions of people who let a badly designed vacation program reply to mailing list items; I write them to explain and ask them to write to me when they're back in person and will be accepting the list again so that I can reactivate their subscriptions then. I also ask them to notify me in the future before they go so that I can turn off their subscriptions during their absences or at the least to fix their vacation setups. From list-managers-owner Sat Jan 20 09:15:55 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id JAA11960 for list-managers-outgoing; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 09:10:32 -0800 (PST) Received: from outsider.bolis.sf-bay.org (bolis.isp.net [204.153.195.10]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id JAA11946 for ; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 09:10:25 -0800 (PST) Received: from hock.bolis.sf-bay.org by outsider.bolis.sf-bay.org with smtp (Smail3.1.29.1 #3) id m0tdgkY-00041jC; Sat, 20 Jan 96 09:06 PST Received: from amillar by hock.bolis.sf-bay.org with smtp (Smail3.1.28.1 #6) id m0tdgWT-000UreC; Sat, 20 Jan 96 08:52 PST Message-Id: Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "Alan Millar" Organization: The Bolis Group To: Keith Moore , "'list-managers@greatcircle.com'" Date: Sat, 20 Jan 1996 08:54:09 -800 Subject: Re: Automated replies and mailing lists X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Windows (v2.01) Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk On 19 Jan 96 at 17:33, Keith Moore wrote: > It's not really clear from RFC 822, but From/Reply-to should probably only be > used for human-generated replies. A number of things aren't clear in RFC 822; that's why RFC 1123 was written. > many systems incorrectly send error messages (i.e. nondelivery reports) to the > >From header address. Such lists usually try to filter out error messages, I'm not sure what you mean by "incorrectly", but RFC1123 clearly states that non-delivery reports must be sent to the envelope address, which is the From_ line. That is the only correct address for error messages to be sent to. - Alan ---- Alan Millar amillar@bolis.SF-Bay.org System Administrator http://www.bolis.com Windows/NT - From the people who brought you EDLIN -Herb Peyerl From list-managers-owner Sat Jan 20 09:30:52 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id JAA12329 for list-managers-outgoing; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 09:14:17 -0800 (PST) Received: from [198.102.244.39] (pm-ppp-1.greatcircle.com [198.102.244.39]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id JAA12304; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 09:14:08 -0800 (PST) X-Sender: brent@miles.greatcircle.com Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Sat, 20 Jan 1996 11:13:22 +0100 To: "David Johnson (Exchange)" , "'list-managers@greatcircle.com'" From: Brent@GreatCircle.COM (Brent Chapman) Subject: Re: Automated replies and mailing lists Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk At 11:19 AM 1/19/96, David Johnson (Exchange) wrote: >I am working with some software that can generate automated replies to >messages users receive. Currently, the software sends these replies to the >address in the Reply-To 822 header if present; otherwise the From header. > >This has caused a problem with at least one mailing list, where the list >server sets From to the original sender, and sets Reply-To to point to the >list. The automated replies go to the list instead of the original sender, >which would be the preferred behavior. (The best solution might be to not >send the automated replies at all, but that is not an option at this point.) >One fix I am considering is to reconfigure the software so it sends >automated replies to the From address instead of Reply-To. > >However, I'm concerned that this might introduce problems with other mailing >lists. If any list servers set the From to point to the list, the problem >will show up again. > >Are any of you list managers out there using such a configuration? There's a better solution, taken from the UNIX "vacation" program: auto-replies should ONLY be sent if the address the auto-replier is monitoring _explicitly_ appears in the "To:" or "Cc:" lines of the header. This very effectively keeps the auto-replier from replying to mailing list postings, etc. -Brent ----------------------+----------------------------+------------------------ Brent Chapman | Great Circle Associates | 1057 West Dana Street Brent@GreatCircle.COM | http://www.greatcircle.com | Mountain View, CA 94041 ----------------------+----------------------------+------------------------ Internet Tutorials from the Experts! From list-managers-owner Sat Jan 20 12:30:53 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id MAA26672 for list-managers-outgoing; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 12:18:19 -0800 (PST) Received: from mycroft.GreatCircle.COM (mycroft.greatcircle.com [198.102.244.35]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id MAA26667 for ; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 12:18:15 -0800 (PST) Received: by mycroft.GreatCircle.COM (8.6.10/SMI-4.1/Brent-951213) id MAA01334; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 12:14:56 -0800 Received: from wilma.cs.utk.edu(128.169.94.141) by mycroft via smap (V1.3mjr) id sma001332; Sat Jan 20 12:13:55 1996 Received: from LOCALHOST by wilma.cs.utk.edu with SMTP (cf v2.11c-UTK) id PAA01349; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 15:14:21 -0500 Message-Id: <199601202014.PAA01349@wilma.cs.utk.edu> X-URI: http://www.cs.utk.edu/~moore/ From: Keith Moore To: "Alan Millar" cc: Keith Moore , "'list-managers@greatcircle.com'" Subject: Re: Automated replies and mailing lists In-reply-to: Your message of "Sat, 20 Jan 1996 08:54:09." Date: Sat, 20 Jan 1996 15:14:14 -0500 Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk > On 19 Jan 96 at 17:33, Keith Moore wrote: > > > It's not really clear from RFC 822, but From/Reply-to should probably > > only be used for human-generated replies. > > A number of things aren't clear in RFC 822; that's why RFC 1123 was > written. Yes, but what's your point? > > many systems incorrectly send error messages (i.e. nondelivery reports) > > to the From header address. Such lists usually try to filter out error > > messages, > > I'm not sure what you mean by "incorrectly", but RFC1123 clearly > states that non-delivery reports must be sent to the envelope > address, which is the From_ line. That is the only correct address > for error messages to be sent to. By "incorrectly", I mean that systems that send non-delivery messages to the address in the From header field violate RFCs 821 and 1123. The so-called From_ line is an artifiact of some UNIX-based mail program; it's not a standard header field and therefore probably not relevant to the question posed by the person from Microsoft. (NB: The From_ line is not the same thing as the From header field.) Also, while the convention is usually that the From_ line contains a copy of the envelope return address, this is not universally true. Sometimes the From_ line contains a reply address, a holdover from the days when some user agents didn't understand RFC 822 message headers. Sometimes the From_ line contains a "bang path" version of the UUCP path back to the sender, which is not quite the same thing as the envelope return address. User agents and mail robots should therefore avoid using From_ if the information is available from a more reliable source. The standard source of the envelope return address is the Return-Path header field. This is also clearly indicated in RFC 1123. Keith Moore From list-managers-owner Sat Jan 20 16:15:53 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id QAA04954 for list-managers-outgoing; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 16:01:32 -0800 (PST) Received: from sulmail.stanford.edu (sulmail.Stanford.EDU [36.31.0.11]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id QAA04917 for ; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 16:01:24 -0800 (PST) Received: from FOON-ISDN2.stanford.edu (Foon-ISDN2.Stanford.EDU [36.179.0.117]) by sulmail.stanford.edu (8.6.12/8.6.6) with SMTP id QAA20084 for ; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 16:02:10 -0800 From: Curtis Foon To: list-managers@greatcircle.com Subject: Newsletters Message-ID: Date: Sat, 20 Jan 1996 15:57:15 -0500 (EST) X-Mailer: Simeon for Windows X-Authentication: none MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; CHARSET=US-ASCII Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Is is possible to use Majordomo for a monthly newsletter mailer? I don't want this to be a discussion list which means nobody can post. Is it possible to have the "From:" to be a constant address rather than the person who sent it. A couple of different people would be generating this newsletter, so I don't want their mail address on the "From:" line. -Curtis ------------------------------------ Curtis Foon cfoon@sulmail.stanford.edu From list-managers-owner Sat Jan 20 19:15:53 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id TAA10762 for list-managers-outgoing; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 19:11:23 -0800 (PST) Received: from mail.erols.com (mail.erols.com [205.252.116.14]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id TAA10757 for ; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 19:11:19 -0800 (PST) Received: from erols.com.erols.com (pppb189.erols.com [206.161.72.189]) by mail.erols.com (8.6.5/8.6.5) with SMTP id WAA15490 for ; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 22:07:49 -0500 Date: Sat, 20 Jan 1996 22:07:49 -0500 Message-Id: <199601210307.WAA15490@mail.erols.com> X-Sender: markb@mail.erols.com X-Mailer: Windows Eudora Light Version 1.5.2 Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" To: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM From: Mark Bernkopf Subject: Electronic Mailing Lists and Electronic Newsletters Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Can anyone recommend an article or a book on publishing e-mail newsletters -- including software and hardware options? I am familiar with the names of the listservers and the operating systems. But if there was some article or publication that put all the information in one place, that would be great. There are tons of books on Web publishing, but I've not found a single one on e-mail publishing. Many thanks. ==================================== Mark Bernkopf e-mail: markb@mail.erols.com tel. 703-516-9265 Arlington, Virginia, U.S.A. ==================================== From list-managers-owner Sat Jan 20 19:30:55 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id TAA11080 for list-managers-outgoing; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 19:20:28 -0800 (PST) Received: from outsider.bolis.sf-bay.org (bolis.isp.net [204.153.195.10]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id TAA11066 for ; Sat, 20 Jan 1996 19:20:20 -0800 (PST) Received: from hock.bolis.sf-bay.org by outsider.bolis.sf-bay.org with smtp (Smail3.1.29.1 #3) id m0tdqGq-00040xC; Sat, 20 Jan 96 19:16 PST Received: from amillar by hock.bolis.sf-bay.org with smtp (Smail3.1.28.1 #6) id m0tdq1g-000UreC; Sat, 20 Jan 96 19:01 PST Message-Id: Comments: Authenticated sender is From: "Alan Millar" Organization: The Bolis Group To: Keith Moore , Date: Sat, 20 Jan 1996 19:02:09 -800 Subject: Re: Automated replies and mailing lists X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Windows (v2.01) Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk On 20 Jan 96 at 15:14, Keith Moore wrote: > > > It's not really clear from RFC 822, but From/Reply-to should probably > > > only be used for human-generated replies. > > > > A number of things aren't clear in RFC 822; that's why RFC 1123 was > > written. > > Yes, but what's your point? I misunderstood what you meant. My point actually was that RFC 822 isn't as clear as 1123 that error notices should go back to the envelope sender. > > > many systems incorrectly send error messages (i.e. nondelivery reports) > > > to the From header address. Such lists usually try to filter out error > > > messages, > > > > I'm not sure what you mean by "incorrectly", but RFC1123 clearly > > states that non-delivery reports must be sent to the envelope > > address, which is the From_ line. That is the only correct address > > for error messages to be sent to. > By "incorrectly", I mean that systems that send non-delivery messages to > the address in the From header field violate RFCs 821 and 1123. Sorry, it sounded like you were referring to the From_ line (which in this context I inferred to mean the envelope sender) as being incorrect. My mistake. You are, of course, absolutely correct that the From: header is the incorrect place to send it to. > The so-called From_ line is an artifiact of some UNIX-based mail > program; it's not a standard header field and therefore probably not > relevant to the question posed by the person from Microsoft. > > (NB: The From_ line is not the same thing as the From header field.) > > Also, while the convention is usually that the From_ line contains > a copy of the envelope return address, this is not universally true. > Sometimes the From_ line contains a reply address, a holdover from > the days when some user agents didn't understand RFC 822 message > headers. Sometimes the From_ line contains a "bang path" version > of the UUCP path back to the sender, which is not quite the same thing > as the envelope return address. > > User agents and mail robots should therefore avoid using From_ if > the information is available from a more reliable source. The > standard source of the envelope return address is the Return-Path > header field. This is also clearly indicated in RFC 1123. Interesting; I haven't come across a system that had a reply address in the From_ line, but it wouldn't surprise me that they're out there :-) Thanks for the extra info. - Alan ---- Alan Millar amillar@bolis.SF-Bay.org System Administrator http://www.bolis.com What part of 'NO' don't you understand? From list-managers-owner Sun Jan 21 05:45:54 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id FAA02882 for list-managers-outgoing; Sun, 21 Jan 1996 05:42:20 -0800 (PST) Received: from felix.dircon.co.uk (felix.dircon.co.uk [193.128.224.10]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with SMTP id FAA02866 for ; Sun, 21 Jan 1996 05:42:13 -0800 (PST) Received: by felix.dircon.co.uk id AA26715 (5.67b/IDA-1.5 for ); Sun, 21 Jan 1996 13:40:58 GMT Received: from diversity.org.uk(193.128.226.199) by amnesiac via smap (V1.3) id smab26683; Sun Jan 21 13:40:43 1996 From: nigel@stonewall.demon.co.uk Subject: Re: Automated replies and mailing lists Organization: Digital Diversity Date: Sun, 21 Jan 1996 12:22:43 GMT Message-Id: References: To: list-managers@stonewall.demon.co.uk Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk In article amillar@bolis.sf-bay.org (Alan Millar) writes: >I'm not sure what you mean by "incorrectly", but RFC1123 clearly >states that non-delivery reports must be sent to the envelope >address, which is the From_ line. That is the only correct address >for error messages to be sent to. That's all very well, but there are a *lot* of systems out there that aren't compliant. Maybe I've come across these more because I'm in the UK, and I suspect that a lot of people simply bodged their old JNT compliant software to work with the internet protocols. I regularly receive bounces to the From: address, Reply-To: and To: list-managers Nigel. -- Nigel Whitfield nigel@diversity.org.uk Digital Diversity nigel@stonewall.demon.co.uk and uk-motss ***** All demon.co.uk sites are independently run internet hosts ***** From list-managers-owner Sun Jan 21 12:30:55 1996 Received: (majordom@localhost) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1-lists/Lists-951222-1) id MAA10664 for list-managers-outgoing; Sun, 21 Jan 1996 12:26:52 -0800 (PST) Received: from xroads.vthrc.uq.edu.au (xroads.vthrc.uq.edu.au [130.102.4.16]) by miles.greatcircle.com (8.7.1/Miles-951221-1) with ESMTP id MAA10656 for ; Sun, 21 Jan 1996 12:26:45 -0800 (PST) Received: (from root@localhost) by xroads.vthrc.uq.edu.au (8.7.3/8.7.3) id GAA07477 for ; Mon, 22 Jan 1996 06:18:22 +1000 (EST) Received: from arundel.vthrc.uq.edu.au(130.102.4.21) by xroads.vthrc.uq.edu.au via smap (V1.3) id sma007474; Mon Jan 22 06:18:03 1996 X-Sender: Vthomas@xroads.vthrc.uq.edu.au. Message-Id: Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Mon, 22 Jan 1996 06:24:43 +1000 To: List-Managers@GreatCircle.COM From: D.Thomas@vthrc.uq.edu.au (Danny Thomas) Subject: Re: Automated replies and mailing lists Sender: list-managers-owner@GreatCircle.COM Precedence: bulk Brent@GreatCircle.COM (Brent Chapman) writes >There's a better solution, taken from the UNIX "vacation" program: >auto-replies should ONLY be sent if the address the auto-replier is >monitoring _explicitly_ appears in the "To:" or "Cc:" lines of the header. >This very effectively keeps the auto-replier from replying to mailing list >postings, etc. vacation does seem to do a good job but at least the one bundled with NetBSD uses two more heuristics in addition to To/Cc to determine whether to reply. These are listed at bottom of this comment block extracted from my deliver.sys script (deliver is an automated mailer). # 2) determining whether a reply should be generated. # This decision becomes more important when the program # is part of the user agent and without access to the # envelope address. I have also come across a few mailing- # lists which foolishly use the list address in the # envelope. Auto-generated noise might be an incentive # for this aspect to be changed 8-). # Still we want to minimize returns even if the envelope # address is reliably good, even if only to cut down on # the volume of mail admins have to filter. # # wrt to (1), we trust that sendmail's $g macro gives us # what we want. # wrt to (2), we consider a reply ill-advised when: # recipient address is not in To or Cc headers # a few mailing-lists do place recipient there # so they better have a *-errors reply envelope! # priority is bulk or junk # sender address is "postmaster", "uucp", "mailer", # "mailer-daemon" or "*-request" # NB these three are from vacation(1) # the combination of (1) and (2) is p