[Exim] Mailman and bounce handling

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Author: Stephen Gran
Date:  
To: exim-users
Subject: [Exim] Mailman and bounce handling
Hello all,

I am using mailman with exim at several sites, and am very happy with
it for the most part. However I am getting a large number of bounces
back to addresses that don't actually send mail, like the actual list
address or the -request address. I 550 bounces to addresses that don't
send mail (like webmaster, hostmaster, etc) with a nice little recipe
from this list, but I am trying to think through the ramifications of
extending that to mailman addresses.

For the most part, mailman does a good job and just eats the bounces, or
forwards them on if it can't figure out that it's a bounce. Some times,
though, I get into a situation where somebody sends an email to a
moderated list with the envelope from set to another mailman list, and
we get into a bounce war, each setting the address to -admin, so it is
not seen as a bounce, and gets a 'your message is waiting for
moderation' notice, and the whole thing spins out of control for a
while.

It's easy enough to fix each time, but I was wondering if anyone had
already put some thought into how to deal with this sort of thing and
had any good ideas or recipes they felt like sharing. The best I've
come up with so far is to run a cronjob to generate a list of mailman
associated address that don't actually send mail, and then refuse mail
with either null senders, or the couple of known list addresses that
we've got into this bounce war with. I am not sure that this is the
best solution, though. It seems as if the solution really should be
inside mailman, but since it's not being smart about it, maybe a way
can be found to protect it a little better.

Thanks all,
--
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|  Stephen Gran                  | "'Tis true, 'tis pity, and pity 'tis    |
|  steve@???             | 'tis true." -- Poloniouius, in Willie   |
|  http://www.lobefin.net/~steve | the Shake's _Hamlet, Prince of          |
|                       | Darkness_                               |

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