Re: What happened to "From "???

Ray Olszewski
2005-07-04T21:06:38Z

Hal MacArgle wrote:
[...]
>>3. Most interesting ... in an actual, downloaded mail file, is the "From
>>" line present or not? (Open it with vi or whatever text editor you
>>like, and simply take a look.) If not, is there *any* line that looks
>>like a message delimiter in there? If there is, please post a sample.
>
>
> Cant post a sample because, in despiration <grin>, I purged
> all the tests to start with a level playing field.. Can only mention
> that as originally setup all the messages had: From: as the very
> first word, whereas, when working "properly", now with the older
> apps; the first word is From_.. Of course I mean; From(spc) that's as
> old as Unix IIRC... I've seen it listed as "From_" many times so
> thought that proper...

When you refer to the fist line, do you mean a line that resembles the
following (taken from a raw mail file here):

From REI@email.rei.com Mon Jul 04 09:46:34 2005

but that differs from this form only in that it begins with "From:"
instead of "From "?

Or do you mean that a different sort of line, but one beginning with
"From:", is the first line now?

I'm guessing you mean the first of these, and if so, the culprit is most
likely a bad sendmail-style rewriting rule somewhere in a config file
for something ... whether fetchmail, getmail, sendmail, or something
else (do you use procmail or an equivalent with this setup, for
instance?) I cannot say.

Check the various apps' config files for any rules that involve the word
"From" and see if you hit the jackpot.

Beyond that ... are you *certain* that both apps are giving you the
problem? Did you start with a clean inbox each time you tested, or might
(say) existing messages with the getmail problem have still been present
during the fetchmail test?

And the last thing I can think of is to run tcpdump, or something
similar, to capture the packets your ISP actually sends, to see if the
"From: is in them, rather then being rewritten locally.