Verily didst F. Scott Ophof rise up and spake thus:
>
> On Thu, 15 Jul 1993 08:30:41 -0800 (PDT) Alan Millar said on List-Managers:
> >Verily didst Chip Rosenthal rise up and spake thus:
> >> > Assuming that we could get consistent syntax among the MLMs,
> >> > wouldn't it help the users to have one reserved name to send
> >> > to?  This seems fundamentally obvious to me; what am I missing here?
>
> Do you mean with "one reserved name to send to" that the following
> line:
>
>    HdrName:  [Name of list] <submit-posting-addr>
 
Actually, no.  I just meant the administrative address, such
as "listserv@...", "mailserv@...", "majordomo@...", etc.
 
I'm receiving some flames as to why I am on such a control trip
about this and so forth.  But I really am seriously just asking
why MLMs that have similar but different syntax for a common set
of features couldn't or shouldn't share the same syntax for those
features.  The only answer I am getting so far is "because they
don't have the same syntax".
 
I am sorry that this question seems so offensive to some, but I
only ask it because I have users that ask *me* these questions:
why is it "listserv@here" and "majordomo@there"; why is it
"subscribe list your name" here and "subscribe list your@address"
there?  I assume that if it confuses some, it probably confuses
others also.
 
> According to this alternative, it *should* be a function of MUAs to
> add this header when the user indicates "post this", and leave it
> out when the user says "administrative stuff".
 
Getting new features or functionality into an MUA is going to be
significantly harder than getting them into an MLM.  There are
so many MUAs out there, including many strange systems that
are gatewayed to the Internet.  Ironically, many of the "fringe"
systems are much more likely to be using mailing lists than, say,
usenet news simply because their gateways are mail-only.  In
addition, the sheer number of sites to be updated with new MLM
software is probably several orders of magnitude above the number of
MLMs that are serving them.  This might almost imply that the
reserved list Header: would have to be optional, but that may
defeat much of its usefulness.
 
> Implementation of this alternative means that an item mailed to the
> submit-to-list-addr withOUT that header would have the same result
> as any item currently mailed to the administrative address (which
> is normally of the form <OWNER-listname@..>, <listname-REQUEST@..>,
> <listname-OWNER@..>, or <LISTSERV@..>).
 
This would definitely be bad for all those sites that can't support
the new header item.  All messages intended for list submission
would go to the administrative program and be rejected.
 
- Alan
 
----                                                            ,,,,
Alan Millar            [log in to unmask]              __oo  \
System Administrator                                           =___/
MOSTLY harmless??!!