Subject: [rddp] Email administrivia: "Received:" headers and email management

From: [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 7 Jan 2004 10:48:33 -0500

Since someone's been bitten by this, I thought I'd explain.

IETF mailing list management software does not strip inbound
email headers in messages sent to the list, which results in
rddp email being delivered with more "Received:" headers
(email hops) than one might expect - looking at a couple
of recent messages, my copies have 10-12 "Received:" headers.
Other people will see different counts depending on how many
forwarding hops are involved in delivering their email.

Most email delivery software counts "Received:"
headers on incoming messages and rejects any inbound
message whose count exceeds some threshold in order
to break email forwarding loops.  If that threshold is
set too low, legitimate rddp messages will get rejected.
Allowing a 2x safety/fudge factor, the threshold should
be set to something like 25.  This is *not* in email
client software (e.g., Outlook, Eudora, Netscape Mail);
it's in email delivery software (e.g., Exchange,
sendmail) and can only be set/changed by the postmaster
or administrator of that software.

The IETF mailing list software counts email rejections
- five in a row for any reason generally cause it to
temporarily disable email delivery to the email address
that generated those rejections.  I get notified when
this happens - the most common reason is that someone has
left somewhere and their email address no longer works.
I try to check these notifications and send email when
I see something that shouldn't have disabled email.

Everyone on the rddp list has an email configuration
page at:

https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/options/rddp/<modified-addr>

Where <modified-addr> is obtained by taking the email
address that was subscribed to the list and substituting
"--at--" for "@", e.g., mine is:

https://www1.ietf.org/mailman/options/rddp/black_david--at--emc.com

This is where to check to see if your email has been
disabled, and to re-enable it.  It also contains settings
for digest vs. individual messages and a few other things.
There's a button on this page to email your list password
(needed to unsubscribe or make changes) to you.

Thanks,
--David

----------------------------------------------------
David L. Black, Senior Technologist
EMC Corporation, 176 South St., Hopkinton, MA  01748
+1 (508) 293-7953             FAX: +1 (508) 293-7786
[email-masked]        Mobile: +1 (978) 394-7754
----------------------------------------------------

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