[sclug] Mailing lists that cc you

[Simon Huggins]

Hi David,

On Fri, Sep 03, 2010 at 10:26:54AM +0100, David Given wrote:
> I'm on a mailing list where the users insist on using 'reply all' to
> send messages. The server is then hacked not to send me the copy of the
> message when it sees that I've already received it directly.

Wow that's a special and new way to break mailing lists.

> Unfortunately this means that the messages I receive come from the
> respondents directly, which means they don't have the mailing list
> headers, which means that Thunderbird doesn't know they came from a
> mailing list and doesn't give me the 'Reply List...' option. This means
> that in order to reply I have to use 'Reply all...' and then manually
> edit the recipients list, every time, which is a pain in the arse.

> Does anyone know if there's an easy way to persuade Thunderbird that
> such messages belong to a specific mailing list? Any attempt to persuade
> people not to cc me because, like, I'm already on the list, just results
> in snotty replies that 'my MUA should be able to cope'. Any suggestions
> as to how I can make it cope?

I think this sort of thing is normally solved in procmail.
Can you arrange to spawn procmail over your mailbox before thunderbird
gets to it?

You should be able to see that the list is one of the recipients and add
faked up list headers.

:0 fhw
* ^TO.*listname at idiots.com
| formail -I "List-Id: <listname at idiots.com>"

fhw are:
       f    Consider the pipe as a filter.
       h    Feed the header to the pipe, file or mail destination (default).
       w    Wait  for  the  filter or program to finish and check its exitcode
            (normally ignored); if the filter is unsuccessful, then  the text
            will not have been filtered.

And formail -I is replace any existing field with your own.


But it's really horrible.  Is the list worth it?  Is it a technical
list?  (name and shame so we can all point and laugh ;))

-- 
 _        huggie at earth.li      -+*+-     fou, con et anglais      _
(_)       "Ok, I think we got off on the wrong foot here"        (_)
(_)  "That's all you got lady.  Two wrong feet and fucking ugly  (_)
  \___               shoes"  -- Erin Brockovich               ___/
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