Re: bugs + rant + constructive criticism (long)
[ Nathan E Norman writes ]
>...
> On Wed, Jan 03, 2001 at 12:11:21PM -0800, Philip Brown wrote:
> > I guess YOUR mailreader is "too old or disfunctional to be worth
> > discussing"
> > > I did not request you to Cc me.
> > But you replied to the list AND me.
> ...
>
> Since you've set the "Reply-To:" header, wouldn't the reasonable person
> expect that you'd like a reply as well as the list?
Oops. I'd forgotten about that :-)
But that's because my ISP wont let non-root folks set the From: header
when calling sendmail through a command-line mailer.
So IF someone wants to email me directly, I want them to use that address.
But I do NOT want people to Cc me on mailing lists.
> ....
> Phil, you miss the point. Please note that you set your "Reply-To:"
> header. Now please imagine a scenario where you can't control your
> "From:" address (you're at work possibly?): it's set to
> "phil@fascist.job.com" and you definitely DO NOT want replies to come
> to your work address (perhaps there's a fascist regime or something).
> So, you set your "Reply-To:" header to your favorite account:
> "phil@bolthole.com". Cool - now when people reply they'll be sending
> to the right address! Oh, but wait, that damn list you're subscribed
> to rewrites the "Reply-To:" header for its own purposes! Now you're
> going to get a bunch of email going exactly where you don't want it:
> you've been deprived of your right to set an email header.
This case can be solved fairly easily by the mailing list software using
the simplified reply precedence order itself, and doing a little header
rewriting.
-> If only From: is present, leave it alone, and just add Reply-To
-> If Reply-To: is present, rewrite From:, AND add Reply-To
For example:
[original message to list]
From: joe@corp.com
Reply-to: joe-private@somewhere.else
[mailing list resends out as]
From: joe-private@somewhere.else
Reply-to: debian-devel
It shouldn't be a problem that the "joe@corp.com" address goes away,
because after all, if joe wanted that address to really be used, he
wouldn't have set the reply-to in the first place.
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