Subject: Re: Splitting the IETF-Announce list?

From: "John Stracke" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 15 Nov 2001 15:31:06 -0500

>There exist security problems associated with HTML-enabled mail readers,
>and the security of this list (given the MASSIVE number of viri
>distributed through it) is sufficiently suspect to disable that in many
>systems.

We're not talking about this list, though; we're talking about 
ietf-announce, where only the Secretariat can post.  Moreover, we're 
probably talking about an optional digestified form of ietf-announce; 
people who can't trust their MUA don't have to use it.

/===========================================================\
|John Stracke                   |Principal Engineer         |
[email-masked]  |Incentive Systems, Inc.    |
|http://www.incentivesystems.com|My opinions are my own.    |
|===========================================================|
|"What we have here is a failure to assimilate." --Cool Hand|
|Locutius                                                   |
\===========================================================/

---

From: Gene Gaines <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 15 Nov 2001 17:04:26 -0500

---snip---

Wrong thinking.

Gene Gaines
[email-masked]
Sterling, Virginia USA

--

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From: Vernon Schryver <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 15 Nov 2001 16:39:15 -0700 (MST)

> From: "John Stracke" <[email-masked]>
>

There would be still absolutely no excuse for HTML.  Even if the
ietf-announce traffic were safe, by sending HTML you are strongly
encouraging people to misuse misdesigned browswers as their MUAs and
so causing them to be vulnerable to bad traffic from other sources.
Besides, as has been pointed out, those of us who actually subscribe
to ietf-announce have had not trouble using the URLs that have long
been in almost all of those non-HTML messages, whether we are foolish
enough to use a browser for our MUAs or not.

Yes, I'm wondering how many people complaining about ietf-announce
actually subscribe to it, or would subscribe to it in any case.

Vernoe Schryver    [email-masked]

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From: Russ Allbery <[email-masked]>
Date: 15 Nov 2001 16:13:42 -0800

Vernon Schryver <[email-masked]> writes:

> encouraging people to misuse misdesigned browswers as their MUAs and so
> causing them to be vulnerable to bad traffic from other sources.

I can read HTML mail just fine and I'm not using a browser as my MUA.  It
is, however, unnecessarily slow since it has to render.

> actually subscribe to it, or would subscribe to it in any case.

I'm subscribed to ietf-announce.  I would prefer that the I-D traffic go
to a separate mailing list.  I've considered splitting it out that way
myself in the past, since generally I'm only interested in the non-I-D
traffic (which includes RFCs, last calls, meeting announcements, working
group formation notices, and status notifications, all of which I am
interested in reading).

-- 
Russ Allbery ([email-masked])             <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>

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From: Harald Alvestrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 19 Nov 2001 15:54:39 +0100

Seems to me this is a case where "put up or shut up" might apply - we can
test this theory without any centralized action at all.

I *think* the matter of making 2 lists (or 3, or 4, or...) can be done in
about 1 hour using Procmail and Mailman on an Unix box: subscribe once to
the ietf-announce list, let procmail feed into a set of mailman aliases. Go.

Anyone can set up this without any help from the secretariat. If it gathers
10% of the subscribers of the announce list itself, it has proved itself in
the "marketplace", and we can think about letting the Secretariat run the
service.

Anyone who wants to put up?

                    Harald

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From: Robert Moskowitz <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 19 Nov 2001 15:29:04 -0500

Once again, an IETF meeting comes at the same time as Chanuka.

Our wonderful staff have arranged for a room for candlelighting.

Sunset in Salt Lake City is shortly after 5pm so the

Brighton room at the Grand America will be set aside for candlelighting 
from 5:45 until 10pm.

I will be bringing lots of Menorahs and candles for those that do not want 
to bring their own.

Sunday will be a bit of a challenge, as I do not know what time I will be 
arriving, and the menorahs might not get there until monday (I have not set 
up the shipping arrangements yet).

Anyway, look for me in the Brighton room around 6pm!

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From: Bruce Campbell <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 20 Nov 2001 15:39:05 +0100 (CET)

> the ietf-announce list, let procmail feed into a set of mailman aliases. Go.

Ok.  I am going to do this on my personal machine (not connected with my
employer).  The splits that I am proposing to use are those listed at
http://www.ietf.org/maillist.html, being:

	ietf-announce-meeting:	IETF Meeting logistics,
	ietf-announce-agendas:	Agendas for working group and BOF sessions at IETF meetings,
	ietf-announce-wgact:	working group actions,
	ietf-announce-idann: 	Internet-Draft announcements,
	ietf-announce-iesglast:	IESG Last Calls,
	ietf-announce-iesgact:	IESG protocol and document actions,
	ietf-announce-rfc:	RFC announcements.
	ietf-announce-default:	Anything not matched.

The above splits are perhaps, overkill, however they consist of the
'known' categories.  Note that I am going err on the side of caution, and
assume that all subscribers to any of the above would wish to know about
announcements that do not fit into a known category (via the -default
split above).

> Anyone who wants to put up?

Subscription information should be available tomorrow or later tonight,
depending on my available spare time, or whether anyone else bothers to do
this beforehand.  The procmail recipe used to implement such will also be
available.

Regards,

- --
                             Bruce Campbell                            RIPE
                                                                        NCC
             I do not speak for my employer                      Operations

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From: Harald Alvestrand <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 23 Nov 2001 09:33:38 +0100

Thank you!

FWIW, the ietf-announce list had 4717 subscribers (some of which are 
sublists, news gateways and the like) - so any category where you get more 
than 400 subscribers is probably proof positive that a "market" exists for 
a special list for that category.

Looking forward to seeing what happens...

                      Harald

--On tirsdag, november 20, 2001 15:39:05 +0100 Bruce Campbell 
<[email-masked]> wrote:

> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> 	ietf-announce-agendas:	Agendas for working group and BOF sessions at
> IETF meetings, 	ietf-announce-wgact:	working group actions,
>                              Bruce Campbell
> RIPE
> NCC              I do not speak for my employer
> Operations
>
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> Version: GnuPG v1.0.6 (GNU/Linux)
> Comment: For info see http://www.gnupg.org
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From: Bruce Campbell <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 26 Nov 2001 16:14:11 +0100 (CET)

> a special list for that category.

And this has been completed.  The subscription information will be sent in
a seperate message.

I must admit to being rather embarrassed by the whole affair, as my
personal (australian) based machine was meant to be restored to
functionality at the time of making the promise.

My apologies for the time this has taken.

---

From: Bruce Campbell <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 26 Nov 2001 17:51:11 +0100 (CET)

> And this has been completed.  The subscription information will be sent in

As [email-masked] seems intent on reading afore-mentioned seperate and
complete message and then complaining about invalid commands[1], the
relevant information is:

	Email [email-masked] with 'lists' in the
	message body.

	Reply back to message received with the appropriate 'subscribe'
	commands as desired.

[1] Yes, I know about administrivia and sent mails to compensate for that
    behaviour.