[Dan Delaney]

Anyway, this would make the following subject line...

Subject: Re: [MyList] Re: Fwd: [MyList] Re: Hello there (fwd)

...end up looking like this:

Subject: [MyList] Re: Hello there

So, if I send a mail with subject

Subject: Administrivia: [foo] will be changed to [bar]

Mailman should change it to

Subject: [foo] Administrivia: will be changed to [bar]

? I don't think messing with the subject prefix to that extent is a good idea. Regarding stripping of consecutive "Re:" and "Fwd:" strings -- you'd still have problems with the nationalized versions of these ("SV:", "AD:", etc.) that some MUA vendors in their infinite wisdom have implemented, and besides this too have potential problems with stripping away substrings that really was meant to stay where they where.

The result is that your list messages always have readable, comprehendable subjects that don't take 5 minutes to decode, AND your list archives are much more functional and easier to browse because messages which REALLY have the same subject won't be bogged down with 'Re:'s and 'Fwd:'s.

I think this "problem" should be solved in the user's MUA configuration (if the user wants the subjects mangled) and/or in the archiver thread generator.

The archiver thread generator could be made to display sender address for all messages in the thread, but only display the subject at the top of the thread and every time the subject changes _substantially_. Non-substantial subject changes could e.g. be defined as changes which only include addition or removal of "Re:", "Fwd:" and instances of the subject prefix. The _real_ subjects, looking just the way they were sent (modulo subject prefix), would be available in the archive of each particular message.

Example:

Instead of having the archive thread view look like this:

• [Mailman-Developers] foobar gazonk -- Harald Meland Re: [Mailman-Developers] foobar gazonk -- Barry A. Warsaw Re: [Mailman-Developers] florp -- Harald Meland

it could look like this:

• Harald Meland -- [Mailman-Developers] foobar gazonk Barry A. Warsaw Harald Meland -- [Mailman-Developers] florp

(though I admit that it isn't entirely intuitive that "Barry A. Warsaw" is a link to an archived message and not a mailto: URL in this context.)

Harald