Developers of Sympa

[Patrick von der Hagen <address@concealed>]

Aumont - Comite Reseaux des Universites wrote:
> Jeff Abbott wrote:
>
> > > I haven't yet done anything to bounced.pl to get it to
> > > parse out the VERPed return-path for automated bounce processing,  which
> > > should just be a small bit of straightforward programming, but that
> > > wasn't our primary need.
> >
> >
> > Unfortunately it /is/ our primary need from VERP.  
>
> VERP is a 2 step development :
>
>    * generate variable return path. The solution proposed is effective
>      with postfix. Is anyone able to propose some similar solution for
>      sendmail ? In such case those "howto" would be efficience for most
>      server and no development needed for that part in Sympa.
I can't provide a solution for sendmail, but it is certainly possible 
with exim. After having a closer look, I'll provide the necessary 
information (and update the exim-FAQ, which is about exim-3, but does 
not need lots of changes for recent exim-4).

The exim-documentation provides a setup-guide for exim and mailman, 
which by the way points out that it es more efficient to have one 
message sent from mailman to exim and have exim perform VERP, than 
mailman doing VERP and sending hundreds or even thousands of messages to 
exim.

This is certainly valid for the situation when each message should use 
VERP, but it already has been pointed out that mailman (and IIRC 
listserv) can use some logic to use VERP only for a certain percentage 
or just once a day, etc.

Smart approches like "usually don't use VERP, but if a bounce is 
received for an unknown address, activate VERP for the next message sent 
to the list" might be quite interesting, but until proven otherwise, I'd 
delay such possible optimizations (and the analysis, in which situations 
such optimizations actually could speed up delivery) as long as possible...

>    * recognize VERP return path in bounced.pl : this may be quite easy
>      to developp. Please could you send us some bounce as they are
>      received with postfix VERP enabled.
What I know as the original VERP-specification can be found here: 
http://cr.yp.to/proto/verp.txt

Note, however, that it uses "-" to concatenate the real-sender-address 
and the original-recipient-address, like 
address@concealed
other sources (mailman, exim, postfix) user "+" instead, like
address@concealed

I'm not sure wheter there is some kind of "official agreement" on which 
kind to use, personally I prefer the "+"-sign as separator.

I'll try to provide some exim-bounces.

--
CU,
   Patrick.