Different "Re:" Styles

Different "Re:" Styles

[Jens Lautenbacher]

I have often discussion with someone who has a mailer that marks
Replies with "Aw:" instead of "Re:". The net result is that gnus is no
longer able to thread the posting-answer-backanswer-.... chain and
message produces "Re: Aw: blabla" for my answers on his first answer. 

Is there any possibility to tune gnus in a way that it is able to
process "Aw:" at the beginning og a subject line the same way ot does
for "Re:" ?????

Yours,
	Jens

Re: Different "Re:" Styles

[Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen]

Jens Lautenbacher <jens@lemming0.lem.uni-karlsruhe.de> writes:

> I have often discussion with someone who has a mailer that marks
> Replies with "Aw:" instead of "Re:". The net result is that gnus is no
> longer able to thread the posting-answer-backanswer-.... chain and
> message produces "Re: Aw: blabla" for my answers on his first answer. 
> 
> Is there any possibility to tune gnus in a way that it is able to
> process "Aw:" at the beginning og a subject line the same way ot does
> for "Re:" ?????

No, the Re: is hardcoded all over the place.  "Aw:" is broken.  Make
somebody fix that brainded mailer.

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
  larsi@ifi.uio.no * Lars Ingebrigtsen

Re: Different "Re:" Styles

[Jost Krieger]

>>>>> "Lars" == Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@ifi.uio.no> writes:

 Lars> Jens Lautenbacher <jens@lemming0.lem.uni-karlsruhe.de> writes:
 >> I have often discussion with someone who has a mailer that marks
 >> Replies with "Aw:" instead of "Re:". The net result is that gnus
 >> is no longer able to thread the
 >> posting-answer-backanswer-.... chain and message produces "Re: Aw:
 >> blabla" for my answers on his first answer.
 >> 
 >> Is there any possibility to tune gnus in a way that it is able to
 >> process "Aw:" at the beginning og a subject line the same way ot
 >> does for "Re:" ?????

 Lars> No, the Re: is hardcoded all over the place.  "Aw:" is broken.
 Lars> Make somebody fix that brainded mailer.

Yes, yes, yes and no. It is hardcoded, it is braindead, it should be fixed,
but "somebody" is Microsoft. "Aw:" is in reality "AW:", stands probably for "Antwort", 
German for "Reply", and is contained in (the German version of) Microsoft Exchange.
Fat chance of getting that fixed.

By the way, they also put "WL:", where you would expect "Fwd:" ...

Jost
-- 
Jost Krieger, Postmaster, Rechenzentrum der Ruhr-Universitaet Bochum
Jost.Krieger@rz.ruhr-uni-bochum.de

Re: Different "Re:" Styles

[Per Abrahamsen]

The Seal of Good Netkeeping seems to allow rewrites that compensate
for broken software like Microsoft Exchange:

The Good Net-Keeping Seal of Approval says:

> Exception: The software MAY try to compensate for other people's
> broken software by stripping off such non-standard prefixes as
> "Re(2): ", "Re:" (no space), "RE: ", "re: ", or "Re: Re: " and
> replacing them with "Re: ".

Re: Different "Re:" Styles

[Jost Krieger]

For the case of Mail, I cannot find *any* codification of "Re: ", however.

Jost

Re: Different "Re:" Styles

[Ken Raeburn]

> Yes, yes, yes and no. It is hardcoded, it is braindead, it should be fixed,
> but "somebody" is Microsoft. "Aw:" is in reality "AW:", stands probably for "Antwort", 
> German for "Reply", and is contained in (the German version of) Microsoft Exchange.
> Fat chance of getting that fixed.

Well, maybe *they* won't fix it, but it's probably a simple matter of
applying emacs to the binary... :-) It's most likely in there as a
simple constant string.  (And if you do find the right offset, there's
probably some simple set of commands you can give to some DOS/Windoze
editor or debugger to make the same fix, simple enough that you can
publicize it for any user who doesn't even know what "binary" means.)
"Fixing" wl->fwd may be more troublesome, since the strings are of
different length.

(Of course, I don't have the program, I try to avoid Windows when
possible, and I don't know for sure how they code the "Re:"/"Aw:"
addition.  I could be wrong.  It could be very hard to change.)

It should at least be reported as a bug by as many people as possible,
and make sure you let them know why it's wrong.  If it isn't reported,
then there's an even smaller chance they'll fix it.

Re: Different "Re:" Styles

[Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen]

Jost Krieger <Jost.Krieger@rz.ruhr-uni-bochum.de> writes:

> For the case of Mail, I cannot find *any* codification of "Re: ",
> however.

No, RFC822 does not specify that the Subject in replies should have
"Re: " prepended.  RFC822 was written in a long-gone age, where things
that were self-evident simply was not discussed.  RFC822 wasn't
written to be read by morons -- ``Hey, RFC822 doesn't explicitly
prohibit us from adding the string "wE aRe ElItE!!!!!1!!" to the end
of all lines passing through our server, so let's do that!!!!1!''  --
so MicroSoft Exchange can add whatever it wants to any parts of all
mail messages it generates.  Don't expect me to bother with dealing
with the junk, though.

-- 
  "Yes.  The journey through the human heart 
     would have to wait until some other time."

Re: Different "Re:" Styles

[Jason L Tibbitts III]

>>>>> "PA" == Per Abrahamsen <abraham@dina.kvl.dk> writes:

PA> The Seal of Good Netkeeping seems to allow rewrites that compensate for
PA> broken software like Microsoft Exchange:

Didn't we go through this once already?  I recall a big argument with no
resolution.

 - J<