[lug] Re: More on Reply-To

[J. Wayde Allen]

Just returned from a vacation to find lots of philosophical discussion on
the reply-to munging.  Some good points all all sides as usual, but since
this issue primarily deals with personal preferences there probably isn't
one "correct" answer.  Over the past eight or so years of maintaining this
BLUG list as well as a number of others that there are problems both ways,
and can offer the following comments.

Sean touched on the very real issue of the list being a public place.  If
someone posts a question to a group of 500 people it is only reasonable
for the group to also see the answers to that question.  Otherwise, much
of the value of the list is, in my opinion, lost.  On lists with no
reply-to header, posts of questions with no answers is a very real
phenomenon.

Also, the so-called "intuitive" use of the reply-all button on the mailer
isn't as clean as proponents insist.  This typically results in a reply
being sent to the list as well as the sender and anyone else in the cc
block.  Instead of arguments about how "harmful" the reply-to feature is,
these lists generate similar discussions about mysterious intermittent
list failures causing some people to receive messages, some not to receive
messages, and some people to receive more than one copy of the same
message.

The ONLY truly harmful feature of reply-to headers that I'm aware of is
the possibility of creating a mail loop.  However, we watch this
carefully, and the Q-mail system is designed to prevent this.

So ... the problem as I see it really isn't whether the reply-to header is
set or not.  At the root of this issue is that when sending e-mail one
should always verify that the message is going where one wants it to go
before hitting the send button.  The same mistakes can be made no matter
how the reply-to header is set, and we all have differing opinions about
just what is really intuitive.

- Wayde
  (wallen at lug.boulder.co.us)