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D. J. Bernstein | 1 Jul 1997 01:48
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Re: best name for followups?

It's important to understand that the author sets followups. Let me
emphasize once again that reply-to munging is harmful; the question is
how to fix the message duplication _without_ reply-to munging.

In light of this understanding, let's review Keith's complaints:

> + The author of the subject message isn't always on the mailing list,
> in which case he misses the replies/followups.

No, he doesn't miss anything, because he puts his own address into the
followup field along with the list address.

Of course, he doesn't have to bother with a followup field in this case,
since the default followup targets will work properly.

If he _is_ on the list, he should supply a followup field without his
address. His MUA can do this automatically if it knows that he's on the
list; some MUAs already support the necessary database.

> + A single message can be posted to multiple mailing lists, in which
> case followups should arguably go to all lists.

So the user puts all the lists into the followup field.

MUAs configured as above will do the right thing automatically.

> When replies
> from my list postings go to moore <at> cs.utk.edu, I can respond more
> quickly.
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Keith Moore | 2 Jul 1997 22:44
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Re: best name for followups?

> It's important to understand that the author sets followups. Let me
> emphasize once again that reply-to munging is harmful; the question is
> how to fix the message duplication _without_ reply-to munging.

In this case, there's no need for a Followup-To header field.  The
existing Reply-To field (as defined in the current 822bis draft) is
sufficient to allow the author to specify his preference as to where
replies should go.

One could argue that Reply-To is broken because so many lists mung it,
and because so many UAs use it only as a replacement for the "From"
address, when doing a "reply to sender and recipients".

I don't really think there is a big need to allow a sender to
separately specify "reply to address-list X if you want to just reply
to me", and "reply to address-list Y if you want to followup".  Even
for those times when this is needed, the author can use From for the
former, and Reply-to for the latter. (With Sender used to indicate the
author's "real" address)

> > And a followup-to like header is certainly not "the" only available
> > solution.  For instance, UAs could suppress duplicate messages.
> 
> Suppressing duplicates is fine, if you can afford to do it securely, but
> it solves only half the problem.
> 
> After a long sequence of followups---let's say a sequence of 500
> messages from different contributors---there are, with current defaults,
> 501 recipient addresses in the header. Software breaks. Humans can no
> longer read the header. Each new message takes ten times as much archive
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D. J. Bernstein | 3 Jul 1997 02:16
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Re: best name for followups?

Keith says that users can control replies with Reply-To (in the absence
of reply-to munging). I agree. However, users currently have no way to
control followups.

Keith then suggests that there's no need for users to control replies
and followups separately. That's absurd. One of the big munging harms
discussed in http://www.unicom.com/FAQ/reply-to-harmful.html is the
user's inability to control replies.

Next Keith proposes using Sender in place of From, using From to control
replies, and using Reply-To to control followups. This is a massive
change from the RFC 822 Reply-To semantics supported by dozens of
existing clients. The transition would be a disaster.

> There's a difference between a human making an intelligent choice
> about where she wants her replies to go,

Here Keith is referring to people deleting recipients from followups.
The problem is that these people don't have the information they need:
are those recipients members of the mailing list? The result is that
non-subscribers are often accidentally removed.

> And if a followup-to field were introduced, lists would add or mung
> that field also, along with reply-to.

If Keith doesn't understand why Reply-To munging happens right now, he
should read http://www.unicom.com/BBS/bbs_forum.cgi?forum=replyto. The
more clients that support a followup field, the less motivation there is
for this type of munging.
(Continue reading)

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Chris Newman | 3 Jul 1997 11:17

Re: best name for followups?

I find the arguments in:
	<http://www.unicom.com/FAQ/reply-to-harmful.html>
very technically compelling.  I'd love to know of any way to make it
politically compelling...

I also find Keith's comment that users don't have the information
necessary to set a followup-to email header correctly, and won't want to
enter one manually compelling; although I disagree that reply-to offers
sufficient functionality.

I think the current situation is broken as I hate having to manually edit
people out of headers all the time and worry that some of the people I'm
removing might not be on the list. 

Now what information does the person who sends to a list have which is
useful to know?

I think there are three useful preferences the sender can communicate:
(1) Keep my personal address in all group replies.
(2) I read the list; but like to get a bcc of group replies to messages I
    post.
(3) I read the list; so don't use my personal address in replies.

What about a new header which simply communicates this information?

Group-Reply-Pref: include-me
Group-Reply-Pref: bcc-me
Group-Reply-Pref: exclude-me

Defaults to "include-me" if not present since that's current practice and
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D. J. Bernstein | 3 Jul 1997 18:28
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Re: best name for followups?

> users don't have the information
> necessary to set a followup-to email header correctly,

The user simply has to

   (1) create a followup field from Reply-To/To/Cc or From/To/Cc, and
   (2) remove his address if it's covered by a mailing list.

Exactly which information is he missing?

#1 is trivial to do automatically. #2 is also trivial for MUAs that know
which lists the user is on, such as mutt.

> Group-Reply-Pref: exclude-me

This is the Mail-Copies-To approach. It covers many simple situations,
as I mentioned---for example, the default situation described above.

However, I prefer a followup field, for the same reason that I like
having a followup field in news: it's more flexible. For example, I can
manually redirect a crossposted discussion away from an inappropriate
mailing list.

---Dan
Let your users manage their own mailing lists. http://pobox.com/~djb/qmail.html
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Keith Moore | 4 Jul 1997 02:08
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Re: best name for followups?

> However, I prefer a followup field, for the same reason that I like
> having a followup field in news: it's more flexible. For example, I can
> manually redirect a crossposted discussion away from an inappropriate
> mailing list.

In email, using reply-to, I can manually redirect a discussion away from 
inappropriate recipients.  What's the difference?

Keith
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Keith Moore | 4 Jul 1997 02:04
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Re: best name for followups?

> Keith says that users can control replies with Reply-To (in the absence
> of reply-to munging). I agree. However, users currently have no way to
> control followups.

True.  But you haven't demonstrated that followups are (a) significantly
distinct from replies and (b) worth having.

> Keith then suggests that there's no need for users to control replies
> and followups separately. That's absurd.

Not if there's no good reason to have followups (as distinct from
replies) in the first place.

> One of the big munging harms
> discussed in http://www.unicom.com/FAQ/reply-to-harmful.html is the
> user's inability to control replies.

Yes, but the same problems and more would exist for followups if followup-to were defined, because lists
would mung those as well.

Oddly enough, the best way I can see to get lists to stop munging reply-to
is to define some sort of list-reply-to header and get UAs to support that.
This would still be confusing to users, but at least there would be a 
clear separation of function - reply-to is specified by the message
author, and list-reply-to is specified by the list that you received
the message from.  And it wouldn't stop reply-to munging entirely, but
it might decrease its 
incedence.

> Next Keith proposes using Sender in place of From, using From to control
(Continue reading)

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Jacob Palme | 5 Jul 1997 18:20
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Advise on the implementation of Supersedes, In-Reply-To and References e-mail headers

I have written a draft document with advice on how to implement the
Supersedes, In-Reply-To and References headers in mail and news
user agents.

The document has been submitted to IETF drafts is available at URL:
ftp://ftp.dsv.su.se/users/jpalme/draft-palme-newfields-info-00.txt,
and its text is copied below in this message:

--- --- cut here --- ---

Network Working Group                                       Jacob Palme
Internet Draft                                 Stockholm University/KTH
draft-palme-newfields-info-00.doc
IETF status: To become an informational RFC
Expires: January 1998                                         July 1997

Advise on the implementation of In-Reply-To, References and Supersedes
e-mail and netnews headers

Status of this Document

This document is an Internet-Draft. Internet-Drafts are working
documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), its areas, and
its working groups. Note that other groups may also distribute working
documents as Internet-Drafts.

Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any
time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference material
or to cite them other than as ``work in progress.''
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D. J. Bernstein | 9 Jul 1997 01:54
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Re: best name for followups?

Time for a reality check.

BSD Mail supports two response functions:

   1. ``reply to originator'' = From.
   2. ``send mail to sender and all recipients'' = From + To + Cc.

Elm supports two response functions:

   1. ``reply'' = From.
   2. ``group reply'' = From + To + Cc.

Pine supports one function but asks ``reply to all recipients?'':

   1. ``no'' = From.
   2. ``yes'' = From + To + Cc.

Mutt supports two response functions:

   1. ``reply'' = From.
   2. ``reply to all recipients'' = From + To + Cc.

Does Keith see the pattern yet? Or shall I start listing non-UNIX
mailers too?

There's certainly no standardization at the edges of these functions.
For example, some MUAs copy the original To into the new Cc field; some
copy it into the new To field.

But there's always a reply function, using From in the common case, and
(Continue reading)

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D. J. Bernstein | 9 Jul 1997 05:17
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Re: best name for followups?

> In email, using reply-to, I can manually redirect a discussion away from 
> inappropriate recipients.  What's the difference?

My proposal---using Reply-To to control replies, and a followup field to
control followups---is a _labelled_ change from RFC 822 semantics.

Your proposal---using From to control replies, and Reply-To to control
followups---is an _unlabelled_ change from RFC 822 semantics.

You keep complaining that MUAs don't use From and Reply-To the way you
suggest. That's because they're following RFC 822, section 4.4.4.

Of course, this is only a guess at what your proposal means, since you
consistently refuse to say what you want real MUAs to do with their two
built-in response functions.

---Dan
Let your users manage their own mailing lists. http://pobox.com/~djb/qmail.html
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Gmane