[hanno at liem.cn: Re: [Mailman-Users] Automatic bounce handling]

Hanno Liem hanno at liem.cn
Sat Dec 29 11:01:19 CET 2001


(argh, forgot the CC header)

----- Forwarded message from Hanno Liem <hanno at liem.cn> -----

Date: Sat, 29 Dec 2001 10:58:17 +0100
From: Hanno Liem <hanno at liem.cn>
To: John W Baxter <jwblist at olympus.net>
Subject: Re: [Mailman-Users] Automatic bounce handling

On Fri, Dec 28, 2001 at 10:30:15PM -0800, John W Baxter wrote:
> >I have a short question to which I could not find anything in the archives
> >or on the web. Silly perhaps, but:
> >
> >... is automatic bounce detection automatically enabled when you activate it
> >on the status page? I wonder how this would work then - because as far as I
> >can see, bounces go to the person who sent the posting to the list, and is
> >never seen by mailman?!
> >
> >The way I *thought* it should work is by putting a reply-to header in the
> >message which redirects to the mailman 'bounce handler' script.
> 
> Sensible mail transport agents (MTAs) totally ignore the Reply-To: header,
> and send bounces to the envelope sender (which a mail user usually doesn't
> see).  That address points back to the list's admin address.
> 
> For the mailman-users list, the address is:
> 
> Return-path: <mailman-users-admin at python.org>


Hi John,

thanx for your reply. I just checked - and in emails going out of my own
mailman list, the 'return-path' header set to the poster of the message! And
I did not see any place in the webinterface to change it?!

One reason why this may be caused is because the 'reply-to' option is still
set to the poster's address (this is an announcement mailing list, always
sends mail from info@). I think it is a slight bug in Mailman that once this
address is set, you cannot wipe it any more. 

I used to have an explicit reply-to header, but then stopped being silly and
set it to 'poster'. Still cannot remove the address from the webinterface
though.

(I can change it to something else, but if I leave it empty and hit Submit,
it comes up unchanged)

Perhaps mailman sets the 'Return-path:' header to this address?

grtz

Han (cc:'ed to users-list in case any of the developers wants to know)
-- 
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hanno Liem | hann0 on IRC | hanno at liem.cn
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
"I do not know with what weapons World War III will be fought. But I do know
 that World War IV will be fought with rocks and spears." -- Albert Einstein




More information about the Mailman-Users mailing list