Re: References in forwarded messages

On 2026-08-24 10:26:30 +0100, Ian Collier via Mutt-dev wrote:
> On Sun, Aug 23, 2026 at 10:19:11PM -0400, Kurt Hackenberg wrote:
> > I think Mutt should not do that, because a forwarded message is not a reply.
> > Those two message types are used for different purposes. Conflating them
> > would cause confusion and frustration.
> 
> I agree that a forwarded message is not a reply and should not be
> recorded in the In-Reply-To header.  However, I think that if you
> forward a message then you are explicitly referring to it, and so there
> is no clear reason why the References header should not be used.  On the
> other hand, this doesn't benefit the recipient, because they don't have
> the original message (or you wouldn't have needed to forward it).

If the forwarded message has

  References: <A> <B> <C>
  Message-ID: <D>

it is debatable whether to put <D> in the "References:" of the new
message. But it really makes sense to still have <A> <B> <C> in the
"References:" of the new message.

-- 
Vincent Lefèvre <[email protected]> - Web: <https://www.vinc17.net/>
100% accessible validated (X)HTML - Blog: <https://www.vinc17.net/blog/>
Work: CR INRIA - computer arithmetic / Pascaline project (LIP, ENS-Lyon)