bug#335: bug tracking system leads to duplicate replies appearing

[Joe Wells <jbw@macs.hw.ac.uk>]

I've noticed that most of the replies appearing in the gnu.emacs.bug
newsgroup seems to be duplicated.  This duplication is also occurring
in the bug-gnu-emacs mailing list (although most of the web interfaces
to the mailing list detect and hide the duplicates).

I believe this is due to messages being addressed to both
bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org and XYZ@emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com where XYZ is
the bug number.  When someone follows up, their message gets sent to
bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org twice, because everything sent to
XYZ@emacsbugs.donarmstrong.com will also be sent onward to
bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org.

You can see for yourself in the mailing list archives.  As just one
example, in the file at
<URL:ftp://lists.gnu.org/bug-gnu-emacs/2008-05>, you can see two
messages with the message ID
<jwvwslkzpun.fsf-monnier+emacsbugreports@gnu.org>, which are both
copies of a single message that Stefan Monnier posted in reply to a
bug report I posted earlier.  Interestingly, by the time these two
copies show up in the gnu.emacs.bug USENET newsgroup, they have the
two different message IDs
<mailman.12118.1211578329.18990.bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org> and
<mailman.12121.1211578334.18990.bug-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>.

By the way, it seems at first glance that none of these are the
original message ID of Stefan's message, but instead these are fresh
message IDs chosen by the bug tracking software and mailing list
software.  At least the two message IDs that begin with “mailman” are
definitely fresh.  These pieces of software should *not* be making up
fresh message IDs.  Changing message IDs prevents duplicate filtering
software from working, and also leads to fractured message threads
where the reading software can not tell what is a reply to what.

I hope this bug report is helpful in tracking down and stopping this
useless and confusing duplication of messages.

-- 
Joe


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