Re: Behaviour of approve/approve script changed

[Oliver Xymoron <oxymoron@waste.org>]

(cc:ed to Zmailer list as this seems to stem from a zmailer/sendmail
difference)

On 22 Dec 1996, Jason L Tibbitts III wrote:

> OX> I've just installed 1.94.1#6 over 1.93 and the only problem thus far
> OX> seems to be in bounced message approval.
> 
> The big changes happened between 1.93 and 1.94.  I don't recall any changes
> between 1.94 and 1.94.1.

I didn't bother installing 1.94 because of the impending release of .1.
(Actually, I did install it, I just didn't replace 1.93 with it.)
 
> OX> Firstly, the new bounced message format seems to be incompatible with
> OX> the old approve script,
> 
> Well, with the _old_ approve script.  I'm pretty sure things are
> compatible between 1.94 and 1.94.1, but in any case I don't recall that
> there was any promise of compatibility between tools and different versions
> of Majordomo.  That's why they come packaged together.

I've spent a bit more time debugging it and it looks like it might be a
Zmailer problem, at least partly. I upgraded Majordomo early Saturday
and when everything looked good, I upgraded Zmailer at about midnight
(2.99.38 -> 2.99.43b). If you give Zmailer's 'sendmail this:

> sendmail list@waste.org
Approved: blah

...

Then Zmailer (at least version 2.99.43b) puts the approved line into the
header. If instead I try:

> sendmail
To: list@waste.org

Approved: blah

...

Then an extra blank line is introduced and it arrives at resend like this:

To: list@waste.org


Approved: blah

Resend looks at the first line of the body (ie the second blank line) for
the approved line and, failing, send the rest of the message including the
approved header to the list. This may be a new bug/misfeature in Zmailer,
but I believe the old resend was a bit more forgiving.

> OX> Secondly, using the new approve script with the current resend seems to
> OX> be damaged as well. Here's the result of approving a bounced message on
> OX> a test list:
> 
> I've been using this for some time, so I'm pretty sure that it isn't broken
> now.  It's certainly working properly for my lists. Let me do some more
> tests.
> 
> OX> ps: Pine doesn't send full headers to a pipe unless you toggle rich
> OX> header view on. 
> 
> OK.  Are you saying that we should do something about this broken behavior?
> Bugs in pine aren't exactly our problem.

The problem is that it doesn't get the reply-to: header, which it claims
to need for sub/unsub messages, but doesn't need for bounces. There's no
reason for approve not to be flexible, especially with a popular MUA like
Pine. It's easy to fix, I'll post a patch when I get the above problem
dealt with.

--
 "Love the dolphins," she advised him. "Write by W.A.S.T.E.."