[Mailman-Users] Is there a way to shorten the from: address when bounce handling is on?

[Richard Barrett]

On Friday, July 25, 2003, at 05:08 PM, Davin Dahlgren wrote:

> We are using Mailman 2.1 and when the bounce handling is turned on, the
> from: field in the messages shows up as something like:
> test-bounces+davin=pacifier.com at myfavoritelists.com; on behalf of; 
> Davin
> Dahlgren [davin at pacifier.com].
>

Actually the From: field in the message is not what your MUA is 
displaying.  The From: header of messages passing through Mailman 
usually have the email address of the person posting to the list; 
Mailman doesn't normally mess with the From: headers of a post.

It looks from the headers of your post to the list (X-Mailer: Microsoft 
Outlook, Build 10.0.2627) as though you, and presumably your boss, are 
using Microsoft Outlook as your MUA.

What you (and/or your boss) are probably suffering from is described in 
the Mailman FAQ, see:

http://www.python.org/cgi-bin/faqw-mm.py?req=show&file=faq02.003.htp

At the expense of some reduction in bounce handling capability you can 
shorten the bodged-up 'From' field Outlook is displaying by turning off 
VERP'ing; in your problem example this will reduce:

  test-bounces+davin=pacifier.com at myfavoritelists.com

to:

  test-bouncesm at myfavoritelists.com

An alternative thing you can try, is a hack at the file 
$prefix/Mailman/Handlers/SMTPDirect.py. If you change line 342 in the 
function bulkdeliver() from:

     msg['Sender'] = envsender

to:

     msg['Sender'] = mlist.GetListEmail()

then it will (hopefully) shorten:

   test-bounces+davin=pacifier.com at myfavoritelists.com

to:

   test at myfavoritelists.com

in your problem example and you should be able to leave VERP'ing on.

The only risk with this hack is that any response sent to the address 
in the Sender: header gets sent to the list not to the list's bounce 
alias. But an MTA generating a bounce message should not be using the 
address in the Sender: header of the message but the address of the 
sender from the envelope of the SMTP transaction, which should be the 
list's VERP'ed bounce alias, as we would want.

But no warranty with the hack. Take a copy of SMTPDirect.py before you 
start. Be careful with the editing. Remember source code indentation is 
syntactically significant with Python. Try some tests, including adding 
duff mail addresses to your test list to see what happens when things 
bounce.

Let us know how you get on.

> My boss thinks this looks like spam and he's freaking out that he's
> losing money because of it. Is there any way to use the bounce handling
> features without having the long from: address header?
>
> Does version 2.1.2 fix this?
>

No, because MM is doing it right already. But if you are not running 
2.1.2, the latest stable release, now is the time to upgrade; it has a 
number of real bug fixes and enhancements over 2.1

> Thanks,
> Davin