[Mailman-Users] Bounces not resetting...

[Mark Sapiro]

John Withers wrote:
>
>> The stale bounce info is not reset until another bounce arrives. Thus,
>> old bounce info usually remains forever, but it does no harm. If a new
>> bounce arrives, the stale info will be forgotten and the user given a
>> score of 1 with the current date.
>> 
>
>Hmmm, so when it says specifically "The number of days after which a
>member's bounce information is discarded, if no new bounces have been
>received in the interim." It doesn't actually mean it. It means number
>of days after which a member's bounce information is discarded if we
>happen to get another bounce. Hmmm. Not good.


It means the number of days after which a member's bounce info is
ignored. Change the word 'discarded' to ' ignored' and it is a correct
statement, at least in current Mailman.


>Ah, if only it were true that it does no harm.
>
>Following scenario: for various reasons, the bounces were set
>exceptionally high on a list: 300. Now a new administrator takes over,
>sees that things aren't as they should be. Says, hmmm, we should lower
>that into reality and lose all these dead accounts I know we are
>carrying, lowers the number to 7.
>
>Suddenly, a lot of perfectly good users get hit with disable's.
>Secondly, the behavior is baffling to the admin, because the text for
>the bounce_info_stale_after is clear that these old bounces should have
>been discarded.


That behavior is the result of a bug that was fixed in 2.1.10.
cron/disabled now resets the bounce info in this circumstance instead
of disabling the member.

-- 
Mark Sapiro <mark at msapiro.net>        The highway is for gamblers,
San Francisco Bay Area, California    better use your sense - B. Dylan