Subject: new listserv addressing....

From: James Helman <[email-masked]>
Date: Sun, 16 Feb 92 13:11:05 -0800

Based on the recent glove-list-test traffic and JET's comments, the
new list method uses different addressing.  When a message reaches a
recipient, the "To:" field shows the individual recipient, the "From:"
field will be the individual sender and the "Originator:" field
contains something about the list, e.g.

     Originator: glove-list-test@karazm
     Errors-To: [email-masked]
     Reply-To: <[email-masked]>
     Sender: J Eric Townsend <[email-masked]>
     Version: 5.4 -- Copyright (c) 1991/92, Anastasios Kotsikonas
     From: J Eric Townsend <[email-masked]>
     To: [email-masked]
     Subject: test of listserv, part II

This is totally bogus.  

Why?

	1) I have to visually scan for the "originator" field to see
	whether the message came from a mailing list or was a personal
	message.

	2) Most mailer's do not update the "originator" field, hence
	on some mail paths, the contents of the field will be invalid
	upon receipt (as it was above, without any domain info).

	3) Programs like vacation(1) will think the message is a
	personal one and send out replies saying "I'm on vacation..."
	The normal test is check whether the recipient's name was on
	the To: or Cc: lines.  On big mailing lists this is a real
	pain and waste of bandwidth.  I really don't care if 50 people
	on the list are on Chistmas vacation and won't read my pearls
	of wisdom for another week.

	4) Programs like MH slocal which sort mail into folders based
	on "To:" "From:" and "Cc:" fields can't tell this is a mailing
	list message and file it accordingly.

Suggestion:

	Configure listserv to leave the "To: field as
	"[email-masked]".

regards,

Jim Helman					SGI:  (415) 335-1151
						FAX:  (415) 591-8165
([email-masked]) 			Home: (415) 593-1233

"The power of the computer is locked behind a door with no knob."
							-B. Laurel

---

From: J Eric Townsend <jet>
Date: Sun, 16 Feb 1992 16:19:19 -0600

"James" == James Helman <[email-masked]> writes:

James> 	3) Programs like vacation(1) will think the message is a
James> personal one and send out replies saying "I'm on vacation..."

But they'll only send it to the person who sent the message to the
list, not to the entire list, since the reply-to won't be the list.

James> 	Configure listserv to leave the "To: field as
James> "[email-masked]".

Had I realized that the "To:" field mattered so much, I would have
checked to see what it was being sent to.  I'll tinker a bit and see
if I can change this.

The reason for switching over to the new system is that I run several
mailing lists, and am tired of spending 30min or so a day manually
updating the list info, dealing with bounced messages, etc...

J. Eric Townsend - [email-masked] - Systems Wrangler, UH Dept of Mathematics
vox: (713) 749-2126  '91 CB750, DoD# 0378
They don't need me here, and I know you're there / where the world goes
by like the humid air. -- They Might Be Giants