jeff@heurikon.UUCP (02/11/84)
Does anybody know why some sites seem to mangle their "From" headers? I've seen consistant trouble with harpo, philabs and, now, qusavx. Here's what I mean. This is part of some mail headers: > From seismo!philabs!mcvax!jan Thu Jan 5 07:20:47 1984 remote from uwvax > From: uwvax!seismo!mcvax!jan (Jan Heering) > To: philabs!seismo!uwvax!heurikon!jeff Why is "philabs" missing from the middle "from" header? A bug? This results in a lot of bounced replies. Sometimes there is clear evidence in the headers that the site in question was really on the route and not bypassed. Should the "From:" header be ignored in favor of "From"? -- /"""\ Jeffrey Mattox, Heurikon Corp, Madison, WI |O.O| {harpo, hao, philabs}!seismo!uwvax!heurikon!jeff (news & mail) \_=_/ ihnp4!heurikon!jeff (mail - fast)
mjb@ukc.UUCP (M.J.Bayliss) (02/16/84)
This is a sendmail problem and it's not just restricted to the sites named
in the original article (ukc also generates the same problem).
What happens (as far as i can work out) is:
sendmail generates an UGLYUUCP from line
to find the sitename to put in the "remote from...." it
takes the first component of the $g macro
but... $g is not always correct!
Sites that cause this problem are not adding their own sitename onto
the sender's address at the right place. I've spent two days examining
trace output from sendmail and as far as i can tell $g is continually
reset as the sender address is modified (rulesets 3, 1, 4 and the uucp
mailer sender ruleset). This should be an easy bug to fix but...
When I wrote my sendmail.cf I found I had to use the uucp ruleset to
put "ukc!" on the front of the sender's name, if I didn't sendmail complained
because there was no "!" in the sender. Following the same logic I should
just need to put "ukc!" at the start of every sender's name that goes through
the uucp ruleset. However, this doesn't work and $g does not include the
"ukc!", but does contain the full uucp route upto and including the
sender's site.
I suspect it's because we're all trying to be too clever, and getting
carried away converting everything in sight into "user@site.net" triples.
Are there any sendmail experts out there? Is Eric Allman reading this?
I for one would appreciate help just to stop sites adjacent to me complaining.
mike bayliss University of Kent.
...!{vax135,mcvax}!ukc!mjb
P.S. no flames telling me I should use standard configuration files,
I'm trying to cope with a local network of 8 systems (2 different mail
protocols) and two wide area networks (2 different mail protocols and 2
different naming conventions).jr@qtlon.UUCP (Jim R Oldroyd) (02/18/84)
Mangled "From" lines seem to be a feature of those sites running 4.2 mailers. There are several local sites near here which do it (hopefully we don't - let me know if we do!) and we've been putting up with it for ages now. The problem is that some sites are NOT including their OWN name in mail which they are forwarding!!!!!!!!! Mail which they originate is ok, however. If anyone knows what the FIX is, please post it! -- ++jim <england>!ukc!qtlon!jr ++jim
fair@dual.UUCP (02/22/84)
Please do NOT put up with hosts that do something like snafu!foo@bar.UUCP
to outgoing mail! It is intolerable! It is also the case that every time
I have pointed the problem out to the host involved, the people in charge
have taken the time & effort to fix the problem. It is in their interest
to do so, since mail from them is not answerable by existing mailers.
ARPANAUTS, ignore this. Hopefully, we will be able to present a consistent,
unified domain format interface to you Real Soon Now.
Living with the present, with the intent of changing it,
Erik E. Fair ucbvax!fair fair@ucb-arpa.ARPA
dual!fair@BERKELEY.ARPA
{ihnp4,ucbvax,cbosgd,decwrl,amd70,fortune,zehntel}!dual!fair
Dual Systems Corporation, Berkeley, Californiaeric%ucbarpa@Berkeley.ARPA (Eric Allman) (03/12/84)
I am indeed reading your message.... You have identified the problem correctly -- the UGLYUUCP code is ONLY for cases where you are sticking with the oh-so-ugly technique of stacking UNIX-style from lines, e.g., From uucp .... remote from vax135 >From uucp .... remote from ukc >From mjb .... If you decide to use the ".UUCP" format, you must stop using the stacked "remote from ..." syntax. This can be turned off selectively by having two UUCP mailer definitions, e.g., "olduucp" and "newuucp." eric