Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!lll-crg!lll-lcc!qantel!hplabs!tektronix!uw-beaver!fluke!jeff
From: jeff@fluke.UUCP (Jeff Stearns)
Newsgroups: net.mail,net.mail.headers
Subject: Do you rewrite "From:" lines?
Message-ID: <358@tc-jeff.fluke.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 25-Sep-86 18:42:38 EDT
Article-I.D.: tc-jeff.358
Posted: Thu Sep 25 18:42:38 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 26-Sep-86 21:04:42 EDT
Distribution: net
Organization: John Fluke Mfg. Co., Inc., Everett, WA
Lines: 58
Xref: mnetor net.mail:1215 net.mail.headers:355

Now that I've installed smail, a nasty question comes up.  Should our sendmail
modify "From:" lines?

Background:
    We're a uucp site with a dozen or so neighbors.  We're running Berkeley
    UNIX with sendmail.  We just installed smail.

    Our standard sendmail rewrites "From" and "From:" lines.  Specifically,
    it prepends our sitename to the address.  This is standard practice here
    in uucp-land.  All of our uucp neighbors do it, too.

	An example.  Say we receive this message and relay it to site bletch.
	The message comes in through rmail, passes through sendmail, and exits
	via uux.  It arrives like this:

	    From foo!bar!joeuser  Thu Sep 25 13:29:06 1986
	    Date: Thu Sep 25 13:29:06 1986
	    From: foo!bar!joeuser (Joseph User)
	    To: fluke!bletch!recipient
	    ...

	And sendmail emits it like this:

	    From fluke!foo!bar!joeuser  Thu Sep 25 13:29:06 1986
	    Date: Thu Sep 25 13:29:06 1986
	    From: fluke!foo!bar!joeuser (Joseph User)
	    To: bletch!recipient
	    ...

    So we tacked on our sitename onto "From" and "From:" as the message passed
    through us. 

The problem:
    I've just installed smail.  We're getting domain-ized.  We're trying to
    make a separation between domain addresses and uucp routes.

    What to do with the "From:" line?

    I believe that the theoretically correct answer is this:
	Don't touch the "From:" line at all.  Do your playing with the
	"From" line, so that "From" can indicate a valid UUCP path,
	leaving the sender's domain address in "From:".
	(That last part is a quote from the smail manual page.)

	And this is what smail does.

But all of our neighbors tack their sitename onto the "From:" line as well!
There's gonna be lots of unreplyable(?) mail if we start playing by The Right
Rules while everybody else is Doing What The Majority Does.  (Recall that
4.2BSD /usr/ucb/mail sends replies to the "From:" address, not the "From"
address.)

What's a mother to do?
-- 
	Jeff Stearns       (206) 356-5064
	John Fluke Mfg. Co.
	P.O. Box C9090  Everett WA  98043  
	{uw-beaver,decvax!microsof,ucbvax!lbl-csam,allegra,ssc-vax}!fluke!jeff