Re: References in forwarded messages

Alejandro Colomar via Mutt-dev <[email protected]> Sun, 23 Aug 2026 14:05:32 +0200
Newsgroups	gmane.mail.mutt.devel
Message-ID	<aorhA_ax6raQj2dM@devuan>
Hi Kevin,

> Date: 2026-08-23 13:14:45+0800
> From: "Kevin J. McCarthy" <[email protected]>
>
> On Fri, Aug 21, 2026 at 04:57:21PM +0200, Alejandro Colomar via Mutt-dev wrote:
> > When I forward a message, I want to have it threaded under the original
> > mail.  For that, I manually add either an In-Reply-To or a References
> > (depending on my mood that day, I guess) to have it threaded by mutt(1).
> > 
> > I often forget to do this, so it would be nice if mutt(1) would do it
> > automatically.
> > 
> > I know some people are against this (especially the In-Reply-To one,
> > since it's not a reply, technically).
> > 
> > What do you think of adding a 'References' header field to forwarded
> > mails?
> > 
> > Should we do it with a new config?  (I prefer avoiding a new config, but
> > if we can't have consensus on changing the behavior for everyone, it
> > would be a viable way.)
> 
> This is technically easy to change, but it's heresy from an email client
> perspective. :-)  The biggest issue for me is that it doesn't affect just
> you, but the receiver of the email too.

Yup, I'm aware of that.  But the receiver will only see a reference to
a message that they don't have.  I guess this is implicit by the fact
that I'm forwarding the message to them.  In fact, the way forwarded
messages are formatted, it's obvious that they forward some previous
message (and often, they include some of the original headers --in my
case, including the Message-ID-- in the body).  So, this reference would
be consistent with that.

It's technically not necessary that all References and In-Reply-To
header fields refer to messages existing in the receiver mailbox (and
indeed, it happens often that people CC other people in the middle of
a discussion).

> I'd need to be persuaded that this isn't just "yet another request for a
> config that will be used by three people".  I invite others to chime in if
> you agree or disagree with the proposal.

Ok.  I see the pain in maintaining such options, and it's why I'd prefer
to have this as a behavior change for everyone (but I also see how some
users might oppose to this).


Have a lovely day!
Alex

-- 
<https://www.alejandro-colomar.es>
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