Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-tis!helios.ee.lbl.gov!nosc!ucsd!ucbvax!decwrl!palo-alto!vixie From: vixie@palo-alto.DEC.COM (Paul Vixie) Newsgroups: comp.mail.uucp Subject: Re: rewriting From: lines Message-ID: <3733@palo-alto.DEC.COM> Date: 9 Aug 88 01:09:33 GMT References: <676@bacchus.DEC.COM> <881@vsi1.UUCP> <3674@palo-alto.DEC.COM> <8446@swan.ulowell.edu> Organization: DEC Western Research Lab Lines: 55 In article <8446@swan.ulowell.edu> page@swan.ulowell.edu (Bob Page) writes: # Rude is a relative term. You say munging From: lines is rude. I say # sending Internet sites From: lines like vixie!paul is rude. I almost agree -- except that when you take in something via UUCP, you've got to expect it to be in the natural format for UUCP. So if Sun is trying to be polite by adding @Sun.COM for their internet neighbors, I can support the practice. Rewriting into is different, tho. This was one of my tests, intended to find out just what Sun was really trying to do. It appears that anything coming in over UUCP is fair game. # Rewriting it to # From: vixie!paul@swan.ulowell.edu # will allow Internet systems to reply, as long as my mailer can handle # the address. It should, since I'm the one constructing it. Looks like you run (at least) a passive router. Sun doesn't. So From: vixie!paul@Sun.COM isn't replyable. In such an instance, From: vixie!paul or From: paul@vixie.uucp are about equal to From: vixie!paul@Sun.COM any probably superior, since the message won't have to go to Sun to be rejected. In fact, without the @Sun.COM there, it's something that might trigger somebody ELSE's passive router. With the @Sun.COM there, it's something only a rerouting mailer would be able to "fix". Pfaa. # If Sun doesn't correctly deal with the From: lines it generates, Sun # is being rude to UUCP land. If they pass along bangland addresses to # the Internet, they're propagating your rudeness to the Internet. As I said, if the mail comes into Sun over UUCP, Sun had better be able to deal gracefully with the natural UUCP format of From: lines. So while Sun would be generating Internet rudeness (maybe) by sending a "vixie!paul" address to an internet neighbor, there's no original rudeness to "propagate". # If UUCP hosts would generate non-bang From: lines, or Internet hosts # understood bang paths, this would not be necessary. But it didn't help when I did just that. is a perfectly legal, completely valid, reachable, normal, okay-by-everybody Internet address. If you have an MX mailer and you try to send to that address, it will reach me. If you run a pathalias-based UUCP-only mailer, it will still reach me. # But I agree that rerouting, under any circumstances, is rude. Yeah. :-). -- Paul Vixie Digital Equipment Corporation Work: vixie@dec.com Play: paul@vixie.UUCP Western Research Laboratory uunet!decwrl!vixie uunet!vixie!paul Palo Alto, California, USA +1 415 853 6600 +1 415 864 7013