On Wed, 2005-05-25 at 16:48 -0500, Gustavo Seabra wrote: > On 5/25/05, Paul Howarth <paul@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > > On Wed, 2005-05-25 at 09:39 +0800, John Summerfied wrote: > > > I've been perusing my mail logs and I see mail, some from fedora-list, > > > being declined for these reasons: > > > 1. Encoded bodies > > > 2. Non-roman character sets > > > 3. being called Peter Whalley > > > > > > 1. As most experienced list members prefer plain text, I don't > > > understand the need for base64-encoding of bodies. The only purpose it > > > serves that I know about is to attempt to subvert mail filters. I figure > > > if you don't want me to filter on content, I don't want your email. > > > > Fair enough. Base64 encoded plain text goes straight to the bitbucket on > > my system too, except for mailing list messages, which are all > > whitelisted. > > > > > 2. Non-roman character sets implies the mail's not written in English or > > > any of the other European languages. If anyone writes to me it better be > > > in English because my French hasn't seen much practice since I completed > > > school 40 years ago, and I know no other languages, and English is in > > > any event the standard language for this list. Bouncing mail using > > > non-roman character sets means I get to not see lots of Chinese, > > > Japanese and Korean spam. > > > > It also means you'll get not to see lots of mail in English from people > > whose first language is something that needs a different encoding hence > > their normal mail setting is for other character sets. They don't change > > character sets to send messages in English because it's a hassle to do > > so and there's no need, since the characters needed to communicate in > > English are also present in their default character set. > > > > > 3. I think we discussed this enough some time ago. The filter dropped > > > quite a deal of email. > > > > I never saw a Peter Whalley bounce because my mailserver rejects > > uol.com.br mails on the basis of that domain having no working > > postmaster address. > > > > > I'd like the folk who're compiling the guidelines to add the first two > > > points, and ask the list admin to enforce it. Along with any other good > > > ideas these suggestions trigger. > > > > I'd hope that the guidelines are well peer-reviewed so that problematic > > suggestions such as (2) can be weeded out before they're cast in stone. > > Whatever anti-spam measures Red Hat have in place for this list already > > seem to work *very well*, given the almost entire lack of spam on this > > list (the "computer for sale" message earlier today was one of the very > > very few that got through, and that wasn't a classic mail-to-all-and- > > sundry spam either), and I don't see any urgent need to change that. > > Paul, > > The guidelines are "peer-reviewed", or whatever comes closer to this: > suggestions only get there after discussed here, and *if* there is > some sort of consensus about it. > > Point (1) has been seconded by you, I assume. Point (2) had two > negative answers so far. Let's wait to see how this develops... I believe (1) should be harmless for an English language list such as fedora-list, although there might be a case where a far-eastern poster with a substantial .sig containing "big" characters could trigger base64 encoding of a predominantly English language message. As has been noted before, I think there's so little spam on this list that the need for extra measures is just not there. Paul. -- Paul Howarth <paul@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
