On Thu, 18 Aug 1994 11:34:24 -0500 Joan Korenman
<[log in to unmask]> said:
> So, my question is, what IS the proper way for undeliverable
>list mail to be handled by a postmaster if the list is Send= Private and
>there's a REPLY-TO address pointing back to the list? My understanding
>is that in such a situation bounces should NOT be sent to the address in
>the FROM line but rather to the REPLY-To address, where they will be
>rejected and sent on to the Errors-To address. Am I right?
Unfortunately, there is no simple answer to this question. If you check
the RFC's, they say that the error must go to the SMTP MAIL FROM: address
(and never to the RFC822 Reply-To: or From: address, unless of course it
happens to be the same). Now, the problem with RFC's is that they only
apply to the Internet and generally assume everyone is running Internet
protocols. The reality is very different. Consider the very common
example of a mail gateway between the Internet and another network.
ALASKA.EDU is such a mail gateway (the other network being a local DECNET
network). Well, RFC821/822 provides all sorts of addresses to which all
sorts of things should be sent. MAIL FROM:, Sender:, From:, Reply-To:,
and so on. DECNET (and most LAN mail systems) provides one address to
which everything is sent. Period. So you have three options: change
DECNET (or MS Mail or whatever), don't run a gateway, or violate the RFC.
Of course, most people violate the RFC. Now, no matter what you do,
you'll be wrong, but you can choose *when* you're wrong. For instance,
you can make delivery errors go to the right address, but then when users
reply it goes to the wrong address and the correspondent may never get to
see the message. Or you can make replies go where they should, but then
delivery errors go to the wrong address. And so on, I've only covered 2
of the 4 fields the RFCs define.
Eric
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