[Spambayes] IMPORTANT QUESTION

[Jesse Pelton]

I'm sending a copy of this message to the SpamBayes list so you'll get
the benefit of the experience of everyone who subscribes. I'm just
another user; I try to help out on the list so the developers can focus
on development. I haven't had this particular problem, so my experience
is of limited use to you.
 
That said, one thing that I know happens sometimes is that Outlook
decides that it should disable SpamBayes. Go to Outlook's Help menu,
select "About Microsoft Office Outlook," and click the "Disabled
Items..." button. If SpamBayes is listed, re-enable it.
 
The SpamBayes Manager dialog is only accessible from the SpamBayes
toolbar button, so until you get the toolbar back, you won't be able to
get to the dialog. Let's take one problem at a time, and deal with the
training issue once you've got the toolbar back.


________________________________

	From: M. Anne Clark [mailto:anne at booksbyme.us] 
	Sent: Monday, October 03, 2005 4:18 PM
	To: Jesse Pelton
	Subject: RE: [Spambayes] IMPORTANT QUESTION
	
	
	Thanks for your reply, However I just went to that site and the
space for those buttons is still there, but they're not.  I don't know
what they mean -- because both my DELETE AS SPAM and RECOVER FROM SPAM
buttons are gone.  And-- I don't know how to open up the Spam Bayes
Manager Dialogue, i.e. don't know where it is etc.
	 
	I also don't know how to discard the training database.  Is
there a way I can call you and get a "talk thru" to solve my problems?
	Thanks!
	Anne

		-----Original Message-----
		From: Jesse Pelton [mailto:jsp at PKC.com] 
		Sent: Monday, October 03, 2005 2:11 PM
		To: anne at booksbyme.us; spambayes at python.org
		Subject: RE: [Spambayes] IMPORTANT QUESTION
		
		
		Have you tried the suggestions in
http://spambayes.sourceforge.net/faq.html#the-recover-from-spam-button-n
o-longer-appears?
		 
		As for training, the recommended (simplest and typically
most effective) approach is the obvious one: when SpamBayes puts
something in the Unsure folder or misclassifies a message (thinks it's
spam when it's not or vice versa), use the "Delete as Spam" or "Recover
as Spm" button as appropriate to train SpamBayes. People typically find
that classification improves rapidly; training on ten or so messages
often leads to good results. If you're not getting good results, it may
be worth discarding the training database and starting over.
		 
		There's no way to tell SpamBayes that certain words only
occur in spam. The process of scoring messages as ham or spam works by
looking at how often the words in a message appear in other messages
that you have indicated are spam and/or ham. This tends to work better
than simple black-and-white filtering. For instance, to use your
example, if a friend writes to tell that she's buying a house and
looking for a recommendation for bank to get a mortgage from, filtering
only on mortgage would mean that message is discarded. SpamBayes would
look at every word in the message, and if you've done a good job of
training, it would probably decide that the message is not spam. Another
example: I get lots of messages discussing Cialis, meds, mortgages, etc,
and the spam is almost all correctly classified as such, but your
message got through, because SpamBayes was able to determine that the
despite the presence of these "spammy" terms, your message actually
wasn't spam. (That's pretty cool, when you think about it!)


________________________________

			From: spambayes-bounces at python.org
[mailto:spambayes-bounces at python.org] On Behalf Of M. Anne Clark
			Sent: Monday, October 03, 2005 12:56 PM
			To: spambayes at python.org
			Subject: [Spambayes] IMPORTANT QUESTION
			
			
			Why did my tool bar items for SpamBayes
disappear?  
			IS there a way to HELP train mine?  It sure
isn't learning very well.
			For example; Is there a way to give it certain
words like Cialis, meds, mortgage, etc. so it dumps anything containing
those into the Junk folder?!
			 
			(I can't find answers to those ?s in your FAQ,
AND I'm not familiar with all the software jargon, either.  A simple
answer would be most appreciated.)
			 
			Anne Zoe Clark - WRITER & AUTHOR!
			 
			Rev. M. Anne Clark 
			Wedding of Souls
			   Officiant for Weddings in VT and NH
			     www.weddingofsouls.com
<http://www.weddingofsouls.com/> 
			 
			Super Annie, American Nanny...
			    for peaceful parenting!
			 

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