[Mailman-Users] Line length and wrapping

[Mark Sapiro]

On 02/16/2014 10:36 AM, George Kasica wrote:
> Does mailman enforce and sort of maximum line length in a message and if so at what point will it wrap - this is with content filtering off.


Where are you seeing this wrapping? Any wrapping done by Mailman will be
done by the underlying Python email package. I can't think offhand of
anywhere where text in message bodies will be wrapped except versions
prior to 2.1.10 which didn't recognize/honor a format=flowed parameter
in a Content-Type: header which could result messages apparently being
wrapped inappropriately when msg_header and/or msg_footer are addes to a
text/plain body or when attachments are scrubbed.

Certain headers will be folded in many cases. Most commonly this is the
Subject: header and folding occurs during the addition of
subject_prefix, but Mailman will also manipulate certain other headers
such as Cc: and these also will be subject to folding.


>  Lastly is there a way to set this value or what are the maximum and minimums? Seeing what looks like wrapping at 73 characters which is an odd number to me and causing some issues for one of my list admins so I'm trying to come up with info and answers. 


See section 2.1.1 of RFC2822 and/or RFC5322, both of which say in part

   There are two limits that this standard places on the number of
   characters in a line. Each line of characters MUST be no more than
   998 characters, and SHOULD be no more than 78 characters, excluding
   the CRLF.

This is the rationale for folding 'long' headers, but without knowing
exactly what you're seeing, I can't offer any advice about controlling it.

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