[Mailman-Users] Munging and iOS Mail display of senders' display names

[Peter Shute]

We've recently enabled munging with 2.1.18-1. I think it's already been documented that this causes problems for iOS Mail users where they can no longer see who originally sent the messages. I've discovered that there's a bit more to it than that, at least in iOS 7.1.2, so I'm posting this in case others run into it.

If the email is from "John Smith via list-name <list-name at list-address.com> and if the device owner has *not* created a Contact for list-name at list-address.com on their device, then they'll see at least the left hand part of "John Smith via list-name" as the sender in the mail list and also in the From: header when they open the email.

But if they *have* created a Contact for the list address, they'll only see the name they entered for it in both the mail list and in open emails.

The result is conflicting reports from iOS users about whether iPhones/iPad can display who sent a list email or not.

Experimenting with this, I tried altering the list address in the Contacts by adding an x on the end of it so that the Mail app wouldn't find it. Surprisingly that only made the app display "John Smith via list-name" in open emails. It continued to display the Contact name of the list in the mail list.

It wasn't until I added an x in front of the address that it also displayed the sender's display name in the mail list.

Peter Shute