Re: Subscribed address in trailer

Hi Christian,

> I just want to get rid of workload generated
> through people with dozens of forwards who can't unsubscribe because
> they have no clue which address they are subscribed with

Yes, this is a problem that I face too. I think it would be unkind and
unfair to say that "users are stupid" (though I've been tempted at
times!).  I think a more generous (and accurate) view is that they are
inexperienced and the user agent software they use isn't always as
functional or easy to use as we might wish.

> is it possible to have ezmlm-idx put the subscribed address into the
> trailer of list messages? Can ezmlm-idx do that out of the box (or at
> least has some kind of API for it) or would I have to hack it for that?

Out of the box... no.  However, you can apply the "VERH" patch.
  < http://www.augensalat.de/software/qmail-verh-0.07.tar.gz >
which patches several qmail source files and one (or more) ezmlm-idx files.

It must be noted that adding a trailer to messages may not always be
the best solution.  If I recall correctly, trailers are only added to
text messages (not HTML or rich text messages).  That means that your
trailer may not be consistently added depending on the content type of
messages handled by your list.  Moreover, adding trailers can be
problematic for the integrity of digitally signed messages.  You can
search the archives < http://dir.gmane.org/gmane.mail.ezmlm > for
discussion threads on trailers to learn more and I'm sure others on
this list will chime in to add to or correct my explanation.

I think most list/mail admins favor a strategy of adding a customized
List-Unsubscribe: header to outgoing mail.  The VERH patch handles
this as well.  I believe some mail readers actually understand that
header.  The List-Unsubscribe header is described in RFC 2369 <
http://rfc.net/rfc2369.html >.

I understand that the mail header approach is less visible to users
since many mail readers do not display the raw headers. The
List-Unsubscribe header is not universally exploited by all mail
readers.  That is to say there isn't some nice UI button that says
"Unsubscribe".  On the other hand, at least you will know that all
e-mails that emanate from your list server will have the necessary
information... if only your users looked at the mail headers.

I suppose you could combine the header approach and the trailer text
with the understanding that the trailer may not always get added.

Hope that helps.

David