Forum OpenACS Q&A: Setting up forum replies

1: Setting up forum replies

Posted by Jade Rubick on 04/06/05 04:32 AM

I'd like to set up my forums package so that replies to an email generated by forums adds a posting in that thread.

I believe others have done this before, but I'm unable to find any documentation on it.

I see that there is bounce handling in acs-mail-lite. Hopefully these two don't conflict...

2: Re: Setting up forum replies (response to 1)

Posted by Deds Castillo on 04/06/05 04:49 AM

Jade,

Edit parameters for your notifications package. Would only work for Maildir format mailboxes though.

EmailDomain - should be self explanatory
EmailQmailQueue - the standard Maildir that the user running your nsd process can read
EmailQmailQueueScanP - just set this to 1 to enable scanning
EmailReplyAddressPrefix - a catch all prefix for your notification emails. This is used in constructing the reply-to address of your outgoing mails sent via notifications package. A corresponding catch all email must be made on the system as well, depending on the MTA you are using, this could be done via .forward files, qmail alias files, etc. This should deliver to EmailQmailQueue.

3: Re: Setting up forum replies (response to 1)

Posted by Walter McGinnis on 04/06/05 02:28 PM

I did this recently. I found a decent amount of bugginess from neglected code in the notifications handling of replies. I also hacked the forums handling of email a bit. I can get you the code, but it has some client specific stuff that prevents it from generally being useful. I have a deadline this morning, but I'll try to get you the code and maybe some pointers by Monday.

4: Re: Setting up forum replies (response to 1)

Posted by Mark Aufflick on 04/06/05 03:18 PM

Also beware that the email handling doesn't seem to have any repeat-detection smarts for people who setup out-of-office rules that fire every time.

Mark - in Paris ;)

5: Re: Setting up forum replies (response to 1)

Posted by Jade Rubick on 04/06/05 04:18 PM

I think the main thing I forgot was to restart after getting things set up. It seems to work quite well now.

The forums can be used as an announcement list, if you set up the permissions right...

Thanks for the offers for code, etc... Let's try to get the best stuff into OpenACS. I appreciate any offers of code, though, and will take a look at it.

6: Re: Setting up forum replies (response to 1)

Posted by Romas Mažeika on 04/07/05 08:37 AM

Big issues with mail to forum postings are out of office replies, delivery failure notifications, long signatures, and included original text (which sometimes can include tens of older messages) - all this stuff it's prefered to be blocked.

How does OpenACS behave in such situations?