Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!linus!wivax!decvax!harpo!floyd!vax135!cornell!uw-beaver!tektronix!tekecs!mcg
From: mcg@tekecs.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.news
Subject: Re: not forwarding mail
Message-ID: <1315@tekecs.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 4-Jun-83 14:38:43 EDT
Article-I.D.: tekecs.1315
Posted: Sat Jun  4 14:38:43 1983
Date-Received: Tue, 7-Jun-83 03:52:07 EDT
References: uw-beave.654
Lines: 38


The problem with the scheme suggested by uw-beaver!jim is that
it doesn't always correctly turn the address around! To recap,
the suggested fix was to treat '!' as having higher precedence
that '@'. Unfortunately, in addresses of the form:

	site1!site2!site3!person@site4.UUCP

the '@site.UUCP' could have been added in between sites 1 and 2,
or between 2 and 3, as well as before 1 or after 3. Thus, all of
the following are possible correct addresses for the above:

site4!site1!site2!site3!person = ("site1!site2!site3!person")@site4
site1!site4!site2!site3!person = site1!(("site2!site3!person")@site4)
site1!site2!site4!site3!person = site1!site2!(("site3!person")@site4)
site1!site2!site3!site4!person = site1!site2!site3!("person@site4")

You rightly ask "what's going on here?" The answer is: some sites seem
to be converting parts of addresses that come through them into
Internet-style addresses. Since Internet addresses do not recognize
the '!' as anything other than plain text (i.e. part of the destination
address), they simply append their pseudo-Internet "site.UUCP" on the
end. The next site down the road, being a standard old UNIX mailer,
and not realizing that '@' is special, treats the whole thing like
a string, and just adds its own 'site!' at the front.

In degenerate cases (and I have seen quite a few), you get addresses
like:

	From: foo!bar!biff!person@DECVAX.UUCP!ucbvax@CBOSG.UUCP

with random sprinklings of '!' and '@' all over the place.

What to do? Pressure all the sites which are currently generating
bogus Internet addresses to generate real UUCP addresses when
talking to UUCP. How? I sure don't know...

S. McGeady