Path: utzoo!utgpu!watserv1!watmath!att!cbnewsl!psrc From: psrc@cbnewsl.att.com (Paul S. R. Chisholm) Newsgroups: comp.mail.misc Subject: Re: AT&T replies Summary: human name addressing is useful, but not sufficient Keywords: cbnews Message-ID: <1990Sep5.024430.12926@cbnewsl.att.com> Date: 5 Sep 90 02:44:30 GMT References: <1990Aug19.205508.16479@mthvax.cs.miami.edu> <1255@mtunq.ATT.COM> <7878@gollum.twg.com> Reply-To: psrc@mtunq.att.com (Paul S. R. Chisholm) Distribution: na Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories Lines: 65 What has come before: David S. Herron (david@twg.com, who posts from gollum.twg.com [which is sort of relevant to this discussion, if you think about it]) complained that replies to AT&T users posting from the cbnews systems didn't work. Both Mark Horton (mark@cbfsa.att.com, who posts from cbnewsu.att.com) and I (psrc@mtunq.att.com, who used to post from there, but now post from cbnewsl.att.com) recommended, as a workaround, sending e-mail to a human name at the logical AT&T gateway (e.g., alex.g.bell@att.com). The real solution is to get cbnews messages correctly forwarded. They work in general; Mark and the other members of the AT&T newnews team are working on fixing the remaining cases. My personal workaround is to add a Reply-To: line to my articles. In article <7801@gollum.twg.com>, david@twg.com (David S. Herron) writes: > If the header were to read "From: alex.g.bell@att.com" then it would > work. In article <1990Aug30.183437.11916@cbnewsu.att.com> mark@cbnewsu.att.com (Mark Horton) writes: > Excellent idea, but it runs into trouble for all the John Smith's > or David Jones in a 200,000 person company. We're looking into > solutions for this, but we aren't there yet. In article <7878@gollum.twg.com>, david@twg.com (David S. Herron) writes: > er.. yeah.. And you run into the same trouble with the "attmail" > service you're already running. That there's only one pile of names > and it's rather impossible to avoid collisions in a large enough > pile of names. Human name addressing is convenient . . . but it's not sufficient to handle all cases. If you send mail to attmail!john.smith, I think you'll get a complaint that your mail was undeliverable, a list of all the John Smith's, and your original message. I assume something similar works for john.smith@att.com. In either case, e-mail from John Smith should have a reasonably good From: line, with a "real" e-mail address, not one based on human names. (AT&T Mail will use a bangish address, e.g., From: attmail!jqsmith; it doesn't support DNS addresses. I've talked the the Appropriate People in AT&T Mail, and don't see DNS support any time in the immediate future.) > [Long question about X.500 queries over network in order to fill out > e-mail headers and the like] Mark: > Simple. We will deliver mail, and even help fill out the form for > a specific user. What we don't do is let you browse the directory > to accumulate a list of employees. David: > I read this as saying that particular non-AT&T people will have to be > authorized in some way or another for particular queries and that you > won't answer to open ended queries? Darned tootin', and I hope it stays that way. We *don't* want to give Joe Random a list of every member of the technical staff, with his or her title, address, phone number, and e-mail address. I can always tell when someone sells a (proprietary) AT&T directory to a headhunter or a stock broker; the phones start ringing in alphabetical order. It's a pain in the tush. Human name addressing, fine; invitations for harassment (or distraction from AT&T business) during working hours, no thanks! Paul S. R. Chisholm, AT&T Bell Laboratories att!mtunq!psrc, psrc@mtunq.att.com, AT&T Mail !psrchisholm I'm not speaking for the company, I'm just speaking my mind.