Oh, this one was great. Someone sent mail to a list with a member
whose company receives mail via Compuserve MX. First there was the
bounce message. Not the worst ever seen, but far from the best.
I forwarded the bounce message to the postmaster (1st message below)
and got a startling response.
First, my message forwarding the bounce to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Note the recipients name was *not* in the To: or Cc fields; Compuserve
apparently created a plaintext bcc containing it. They also rewrote
the case in the fulltext name, and inserted a fairly amazing number
of %-directives into the <address>.
=====================================================================
> The following bounce message has been occurring regularly for a person
> at Ryder systems. When it departs here, the To: field is
> [EMAIL PROTECTED] and the envelope is for
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>.
> By the time of the bounce, it seems to have been rewritten into the
> odd bcc format below.
>
> In any case, ``Server's name changed'' is not a very informative
> error message. If there's anything I can do on my end to rectify
> this, please let me know.
>
> Steve
>
> ----- Forwarded message from [EMAIL PROTECTED] -----
>
> Message-Id: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: scs <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Date: Sun, 26 Jul 98 13:30:18
> Subject: Returned mail
> Mime-Version: 1.0
> Content-Type: Multipart/Mixed; Boundary="-- message ----"
>
> ---- message ----
>
> Router: Unable to open mailbox file CSERVE-82/SERVER/CSERVE mail.box:
> Server's name changed
>
> ---- message ----
> Content-Type: Message/rfc822
> Content-Description: RFC822
>
> To: dorsai <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> bcc: "name-removed-by-scs/rdl/rydersysteminc/us" <name-removed-by-scs/rdl
> /rydersysteminc/us%rydersysteminc%rydersysteminc%rydergate
> @notesgw.compuserve.com>
> From: cl29 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Date: 21 Jul 98 13:07:35
> Subject: beer
> MIME-Version: 1.0
> Content-Type: Text/Plain
>
> ---- message ------
>
> ----- End forwarded message -----
Imagine my surpise when a few seconds later this missive arrived:
> Date: Mon, 27 Jul 1998 00:15:50 -0400
> Message-Id: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> References: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> In-Reply-To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Precedence: addrb1
> X-Loop: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> From: CompuServe Postmaster <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Subject: RE: Addressing Members
> Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Error-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Status: RO
> Content-Length: 925
> Lines: 26
>
>
> All CompuServe addresses are either of the form 7xxxx,xxx or
> 1xxxxx,xxx. (where each "x" signifies a digit from 0 to 7).
> There can be from 2 to 4 digits following the comma.
>
> To send mail to such an address from the Internet, change the
> comma to a period and attach "@CompuServe.com" as is shown
> in the following examples:
>
> [EMAIL PROTECTED] or [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
> All CompuServe alphanumeric addresses contain 2-32 characters.
> Valid characters are A-Z, a-z, 0-9, and "_" (underscore).
> There must be one alpha character, but not more than four of
> the same character consecutively. To send mail to such an
> address from the Internet, type the address and attach
> "@CompuServe.com" as is shown in the following example:
>
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
> Please contact [EMAIL PROTECTED] if you need additional
> formatting information for other types of addresses.
>
> Cordially,
>
> The Electronic Postmaster
Note the From address is exactly the address I sent to! My brief and
testy reply was sent to the reply-to, and it doesn't seem to have bounced.
Let's see if a human being responds . . .
--
"Where there's a will, there's a lawyer."
Kinky Friedman, `God Bless John Wayne'
