The mailing list for listmasters using Sympa

[Steve Shipway <address@concealed>]

Hi – I have a feature request to discuss with the list.

 

When using MailMerge, there is a big problem of not knowing for certain exactly what it will look like before you send it.  Even worse, if you have complex TT2 code with an error, you risk distributing a blank message to the list.

 

I suggest there be a ‘test’ handler for distribution of MailMerge lists, where Sympa only distributes to the original sender.

 

To do this with the most flexibility, it could be added as a scenario outcome.  So, as well as ‘do_it’, you could also have ‘test_it’, and could hook this into whatever criteria you want to trigger a test.  For example, in your send scenario, you might have –

 

is_editor([listname],[sender]) smime                -> reject(reason='send_nosmime')

! is_editor([listname],[sender]) md5,smtp,dkim,smime   -> reject(reason='send_editor')

equal([msg_header->Subject],'TEST') md5,smtp,dkim,smime -> test_it

true()                         smtp,dkim,smime,md5  ->  do_it

 

This would only let editors post (and would prevent them from sending SMIME signed messages which break mailmerge) but would also use the test_it outcome if the subject was ‘TEST’.

 

The ‘test_it’ outcome should be like ‘do_it’, but instead of the normal recipient list should only distribute the message to the original sender (even if they would not have normally been a recipient).  Since this would happen post-merge it would allow testing; it would also allow the list owner to set up whatever criteria they want for triggering test mode – maybe look for a custom header, or whatever else.

 

If test_it is seen for a normal (non-mailmerge) list then it can still send back to the original sender for testing.  I’m not sure how the test_it outcome should be handled if used in other scenario; maybe treat it as equivalent to do_it?

 

This might be a lot of work to implement as it adds a new scenario outcome, and I’ve not tried coding it up for myself yet.  However does anyone out there (who uses mailmerge) also see a requirement for this feature?

 

Steve

 

Steve Shipway

University of Auckland

UNIX Systems Design Team Lead

address@concealed

+64 (9) 3737 599 ext 86487

 

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