Return-Path: <ERIC@SEARN.SUNET.SE>
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.lstsrv-l
Date:         Sun, 10 Jan 1993 19:24:13 +0100
From:         Eric Thomas <ERIC@SEARN.BITNET>
Subject:      Messages with long lines and mailing lists
Comments: To: Revised LISTSERV Maintainers <LSTSRV-M@SEARN.BITNET>

Release 1.7e  introduced support for  messages with lines longer  than 80
bytes - provided the local mailer also supports such messages (ie that it
supports mail in  Netdata format). But in order to  reliably exploit this
new feature, all  major gateways and the entire  DISTRIBUTE backbone need
to be upgraded to support Netdata  format. This message contains a status
report,  instructions for  upgrading your  mailer or  gateway, and  a new
requirement for the DISTRIBUTE backbone  which will take effect after the
March table update.

Gateways
--------

The INTERBIT gateways  will, in principle, be  defined as Netdata-capable
with  the February  table update.  If  you are  running a  local/national
gateway registered in DOMAIN NAMES,  it is your responsibility to declare
its ability to process Netdata files in BITEARN NODES (all gateways based
on IBM's SMTP code or on a  VAX running JNET are Netdata-capable). If the
gateway userid is  the main mailer on your system,  you would change your
BITEARN NODES entry from:

       :node.SEARN :servers1.MAILER@SEARN(MAIL,PU,M,BSMTP,p_eric)
to
       :node.SEARN :servers1.MAILER@SEARN(MAIL,ND PU,M,BSMTP,p_eric)

If on  the other hand  the gateway is  an additional server  (typically a
SMTP server), you  would add a new  tag to your entry  with "OUTONLY", to
indicate that this is not the main mailer for your node:

       :node.SEARN :servers2.SMTP@SEARN(MAIL,ND PU,M,OUTONLY,p_eric)

If  you are  making changes  to your  mailer configuration  and/or DOMAIN
NAMES to redirect  INTERBIT mail to your local SMTP,  make sure that this
mail is delivered  in Netdata format. With LMail,  the recommended method
is to use  the LSM$DNT exit rather than changing  DOMAIN NAMES; make sure
to use the NETDATA parameter. With the Crosswell/Wagner mailer, make sure
to  use the  BSMTPN exit  rather than  BSMTP if  you are  post-processing
MAILER PROFILE; if you are modifying  DOMAIN NAMES, make sure the entries
you are changing to point to your local SMTP have a ':mformat.ND PU' tag.

LISTSERV servers
----------------

All LISTSERV servers on the backbone  are now running 1.7e. Thus there is
no risk of truncation by the LISTSERV servers themselves.

Unfortunately, only about  20% of the backbone servers run  a mailer that
supports long lines. This means most of the messages with long lines will
be truncated during delivery, which  is not acceptable. For this reasons,
servers on  the DISTRIBUTE  backbone will  be required  to run  a Netdata
capable mailer  from the March table  update. Warnings will be  issued by
the LISTSERV  version monitor  at SEARN starting  in February.  Note that
this  only applies  to LISTSERV  servers on  the DISTRIBUTE  backbone, ie
servers with ':backbone.YES DISTRIBUTE(NO)'  and LISTEARN servers are not
affected.

Netdata-capable mailers
-----------------------

There are presently two  Netdata-capable mailers for VM: Crosswell/Wagner
(XMAILER) R2.10  or higher, and LMail.  While only LISTSERV sites  on the
DISTRIBUTE backbone  will be *required* to  run one of these  two mailers
after the  March update, all LISTSERV  and LISTEARN sites are  advised to
migrate at their earliest convenience.

The recommended mailer  for LISTSERV is LMail,  which provides additional
functionality to LISTSERV when running version 1.7f or higher, or version
1.7e with development  fix 17E-002D applied. LMail also  requires about 3
times less  CPU and 4  times less I/O  operations than XMAILER  R2.08. To
order LMail,  send mail to ERIC@SEARN  from the userid of  the person who
will be in charge of maintaining it.

If you  prefer to implement the  new requirement with XMAILER  R2.10, you
must also add the following line to LOCAL SYSVARS:

NDMAIL = 1

You will not be fulfilling the requirement unless you add this statement,
which tells LISTSERV  that you are running a  Netdata-capable mailer. For
better safety, you should do it even if you are running LMail: if for any
reason LMail is not logged on when LISTSERV is started, LISTSERV will not
be  able  to query  it  and  will assume  a  Punch-only  mailer to  avoid
permanent loss of data.

Conclusion
----------

The goal of all these changes and requirements is to make it possible for
messages with lines  longer than 80 characters (such  as postscript files
or source code)  to be properly processed by BITNET  mailing lists within
about 2 months.  An important side effect of these  changes is that X.400
users  with addresses  longer than  some 60-70  bytes will  no longer  be
barred from using BITNET services by a  bug in IBM's SMTP code (which IBM
decided not to  do anything about, because it is  only present when using
PUNCH format).
Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU