On Tue, 30 Oct 2007, W B Hacker wrote:

> > would exim add a second header or 
> 
> Yes.

I suppose the question this raises is how does anything downstream looking 
at Precedence: header content interpret two such headers?

I'm not really expecting an answer, but the original poster might want to 
consider and maybe investigate what Exchange does with mail that has two 
Precedence headers: one from the original mail with a value other than 
"(bulk|junk|list)", plus one added by his Exim with one of those values.  
Which does Exchange believe?  And does the order they appear in the 
headers matter?

(I note that RFC 2076 describes the use of Precedence header as 
"Non-standard, controversial, discouraged", although clearly it has 
extensive use via mailing list managers and the like.  It also mentions 
the example value of "first-class", which I have never noticed).

I hadn't actually considered using this header to help Exchange keep a lid 
on autoresponses to messages found to be spam, so this in itself is 
interesting.  I think my approach would be to:

1. make the assumption that no end client really uses a value of 
Precedence: that is other than bulk|junk|list, especially if the message 
is likely to be spam

2. rename any existing Precedence: header to be X-Precedence: or 
something, so at least its original value is preserved somewhere if the 
user really wants to see it

3. then let Exim add "Precedence: bulk" to allow Exchange to detect it.

However, I see from:

http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2006/10/06/429115.aspx

that Exchange 2007 will also not reply to a message with a header 
"X-Auto-Response-Suppress: OOF", so this may be a solution more palatable 
to the original poster.  Shame - it would have been a good opportunity for 
Exchange to promote the use of the (standard) Auto-Submitted header rather 
than create yet another one.  (Other potential for 
"X-Auto-Response-Suppress" appear to be "DR" and "AutoReply", 
comma-separated where several are needed, but documentation appears to be 
sparse.  DR == Delivery Report??).

Jethro.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Jethro R Binks
Computing Officer, IT Services
University Of Strathclyde, Glasgow, UK

-- 
## List details at http://lists.exim.org/mailman/listinfo/exim-users 
## Exim details at http://www.exim.org/
## Please use the Wiki with this list - http://wiki.exim.org/

Reply via email to