Hello Theo, Monday, November 21, 2005, 7:38:28 PM, you wrote:
TVD> On Mon, Nov 21, 2005 at 07:04:50PM -0800, Robert Menschel wrote: >> TVD> meta statements aren't the same as if/then constructs? ;) >> So we're back to the discussion had in January/February about the best >> way to avoid --lint errors when SARE rules are removed from *.cf >> files, but people have score lines for those rules. [...] >> which will always test false. Is there a better way to accomplish >> this? TVD> Well, I think there are two issues here. TVD> First, the "meta TEST 0" construct ought to work, and there's an TVD> easy enough change to make it work. I opened a ticket about it: TVD> http://issues.apache.org/SpamAssassin/show_bug.cgi?id=4698 So I see. Thank you. TVD> Second, what's the appropriate way to deprecate rules? I think TVD> this will require more thought and discussion. Yes. I've been able to deprecate an entire rules file by reducing that file to just comments, and no rules, but then I don't have to worry about the bandwidth of systems pulling in that now-empty file time after time after time. Chris Santerre has had less luck, and has had to become nasty to some systems to get them to stop pulling in obsolete files. Deprecating single rules is even trickier. It's not too big a problem within SA when we deprecate a rule at a major version change, since people expect to have to tweak things then. But in SARE I find it useful to archive rules on a regular basis as they lose strength due to changing spam characteristics. Bob Menschel
