[Mimedefang] Email Filtering Article

[John Nemeth]

On Oct 31,  4:48pm, Daniel Taylor wrote:
} John Nemeth wrote:
} > On Oct 29,  4:01pm, "Chris Gauch" wrote:
} > } > -----Original Message-----
} > } > From: mimedefang-bounces at lists.roaringpenguin.com [mailto:mimedefang-
} > } > bounces at lists.roaringpenguin.com] On Behalf Of Paul Whittney
} > } > Sent: Wednesday, June 08, 2005 8:52 PM
} > } > 
} > } > Most likely people here read slashdot at times (or all the time ;-), but
} > } > there is an article on filtering email, with graphs, and other ideas.
} > } > 
} > } > http://www.acme.com/mail_filtering/
} > } 
} > } Interesting reading...the most memorable paragraph was this one:
} > } 
} > } "Note that qmail, an alternative mail transport program, generates
} > } post-reception bounce messages in circumstances where other mail transports
} > } would have refused the reception. This means every qmail site is basically
} > } an open spam relay. For this reason alone, qmail should never be used by
} > } anyone."
} > 
} >      There are third party patches available to fix this and other
} > problems.  The original author, Daniel J. Bernstein, is refusing to
} > accept them or to even make the necessary changes himself.  The quote
} > is still somewhat true in that out of the box, qmail is a rogue MTA
} > that doesn't behave in an acceptable manner.
} 
} Well, given that djb makes such bold claims for qmail, allowing such bugs
} to persist doesn't do much for his credibility. In fact, I doubt that

     In his opinion, it isn't a bug.  It would have to do with
seperation of functionality.  qmail is a whole bunch of little programs
that do a single simple task, as opposed to one monolithic program like
sendmail.  On this track, the SMTP receiver is just that, a program
that speaks SMTP, receives a message, and dumps in a queue directory
for another program to process.  It doesn't do any processing itself.

     djb has a pretty big ego and really doesn't care what others think
of him.

} anyone who isn't a skilled programmer is qualified to administer a qmail
} installation, what with all the patches necessary just to make it fully
} compliant.

     Your OS packaging system may have it all bundled up for you.

     Given what I know about qmail, I have no particular interest in
even looking at it, so I haven't gone through the work to figure any of
it out.

}-- End of excerpt from Daniel Taylor