mailing list wishlist
justin mason has a mailing list wishlist. the ezmlm-based system for the mysql mailing lists does the archive-permalink thing. it is added to the message as the List-Archive header. (maybe that is an abuse of that header, but it seems more relevant than just putting the link to the main archive in the header.)
there are a number of things i don’t like about ezmlm, but the biggest advantage is that it is decomposed into enough distinct little bits that it is not difficult to rip out and replace specific bits. for example, you can replace the subscription confirmation (and make it web-based, and not vulnerable to stupid autoresponders subscribing themselves) by just adding a program into the manager that handles them before they get to ezmlm-request and ezmlm-manage.
i haven’t spent a lot of time futzing with mailman, but i’ve never really cared for it as a mailing list user.
but i’m not sure it really matters. all the kids are crazy about web-based forums these days. people who recognize the superiority of mailing lists are dinosaurs.
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as it happens, the archive-and-send logic is a single component in ezmlm, so when it sends the message, it has access to the archive number of the message. in the headeradd file, you can add a line like 'List-Archive: http://lists.mysql.com/announce/<#n#>'.
the header just looks like 'List-Archive: http://lists.mysql.com/announce/212'.
the people who i don’t understand are the web-forum users who read everything. that’s just a painful experience with every web forum i’ve seen, relative to tracking a mailing list. but i mostly chalk that up to the fact that i am old (internet-time) and just not hip to these web-based forums.
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nifty! I don't suppose you know where the archive-permalink code came from?
can you post a sample header?
btw, web-based forums and lists have a very different membership profile, AFAICS. mostly, web-based forum users like the way they can dip in occasionally, whereas list users like getting every message.
although RSS may be converging the two...