[Mimedefang] ADMINISTRIVIA: Excessive quoting

[David F. Skoll]

Hi,

I've noticed that a lot of posts on this list excessively quote earlier
posts.

I've now implemented a filter (written in MIMEDefang, of course!) which
helps me reject postings with either (1) more than 60 lines of quoted
material, or (2) less than 50% new material.

Please trim your postings!

Thanks,

David.

P.S.  Here's the snippet from the filter:

sub too_much_quoting {
    if (!open(IN, "<INPUTMSG")) {
        return 0;
    }
    my($quote, $total);

    $quote = 0;
    $total = 0;
    while(<IN>) {
        $quote++ if (/^\s*>/);
        $total++;
    }
    close(IN);
    return 0 if ($total == 0);
    return 1 if ((1.0 * $quote) / (1.0 * $total) >= 0.5) or ($quote >= 60);
    return 0;
}

# ...
# Next bit is inside filter_begin.  Mailman is configured to hold
# messages with specified header.

    if ($ToMDList && too_much_quoting()) {
        action_add_header("X-Hold-For-Approval", "Too much quoting");
    }