Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!mit-eddie!bbn!rochester!cornell!batcomputer!pyramid!tolerant!kennedy
From: kennedy@tolerant.UUCP (Bill Kennedy)
Newsgroups: comp.mail.uucp
Subject: Re: Rerouting of explicit paths
Message-ID: <1423@tolerant.UUCP>
Date: 16 Mar 88 16:33:41 GMT
References: <701@l.cc.purdue.edu> <1642@uhccux.UUCP> <3459@cbmvax.UUCP>
Reply-To: kennedy@tolerant.UUCP (Bill Kennedy)
Distribution: na
Organization: Tolerant Systems Inc., San Jose
Lines: 51
Keywords: mail paths routing

In article <3459@cbmvax.UUCP> grr@cbmvax.UUCP (George Robbins) writes:
>In article <1642@uhccux.UUCP> lee@uhccux.UUCP (Greg Lee) writes:
>> [ much complaining about rutgers... ]
>  [ explanation that rutgers reroutes ]
>If you feel that rutgers is causing your problems, send some non-flamatory
>messages to rutgers!postmaster and see if you can bring Mel around to
>your way of thinking...

I'll not repeat my feelings about this, they have been made clear.  I
would like to point out two things though.  When rutgers agreed to be
the internet forwarder for ssbn (my normal site) Mel made it quite clear
what the rules were. I grumbled then, still do, but those are the rules
and regardless of how often I'd like to brain them (rutgers) I'm lucky
to have them as a neighbor site.  Further, I have *never* had one bit
of trouble getting into or out of the internet (unless there's a black
hole that vacuums up bounced mail).

The second point regards what problem to solve.  If I am mistaken that
we have tried to solve a news (long replies) problem in mail then maybe
we should address it as a mail problem.  There is an abundance of odd
and special characters already in use but maybe one could be added that
says "keep off the grass", i.e. don't re-route unless the first stop is
not a neighbor site.  I suggest tilde or one of the arrows.  This would
obviously have to be limited to "bang" addresses.  I don't know what the
impact would be on the sendmail community but smail would be no harder
to cobble up than it is now for the @'s, %'s, et al.  A companion capa-
bility might be to surround an address in parens to mean "please route
this".  Before I implemented smail/pathalias I was delighted to have a
neighbor figure out where something went.

I don't think we are going to get very far convincing Mel, or anyone at
rutgers who participated in the decision, to change.  They are, after all,
_THE_ source for the uucp maps and by definition if not default, should
be expected to know who and where things are.  Nor do I want to play down
how angry I get when they ride roughshod over something that should have
worked (I got an email note that the return rate on rutgers re-routes was
a measured 85%...).  I just don't think they are going to change to anything
that isn't a marked improvement over what we have.  Critique away at my
feeble suggestions, let's get some minds working on solutions.

When I get flaming drooling mad at rutgers for wrecking something I sent
it helps me to remember that they had to relay the bounce as well, so the
pain isn't uniquely mine.  I have to get flaming drooling mad before I
remember though :-).  Let's change the tone and explore some alternatives.
Maybe we can get Mel, Larry, and Mark involved as contributors who know
what they are talking about.

The opinions are strictly my own, Tolerant is nice enough to let me use
their equipment, so don't blame them for me.

Bill Kennedy {rutgers,cbosgd,killer}!ssbn!bill  or bill@ssbn.WLK.COM