File: uce.el.html
The code in this file provides a semi-automatic means of replying to unsolicited commercial email (UCE) you might get. Currently, it only works with Rmail and Gnus. If you would like to make it work with other mail readers, see the mail-client dependent section of uce-reply-to-uce. Please let me know about your changes so I can incorporate them. I'd appreciate it.
NOTE: We don't recommend using this feature; see the message in
'uce-reply-to-uce' for the reasons.
The command uce-reply-to-uce, if called when the current message buffer is a UCE, will setup a reply *mail* buffer as follows. It scans the full headers of the message for: 1) the normal return address of the sender (From, Reply-To lines), and puts these addresses into the To: header, along with abuse@offenders.host; 2) the mailhub that first saw this message, and adds the address of its postmaster into the To: header; and 3), finally, it looks at the Message-Id and adds the postmaster of that host to the list of addresses.
Then, we add an "Errors-To: nobody@localhost" header, so that if some of these addresses are not actually correct, we will never see bounced mail. Also, mail-self-blind and mail-archive-file-name take no effect: the ideology is that we don't want to save junk or replies to junk.
Then we insert a template into the buffer (a customizable message that explains what has happened), customizable signature, and the original message with full headers and envelope for postmasters. Then the buffer is left for editing.
The reason that the function uce-reply-to-uce is mail-client
dependent is that we want the full headers of the original message,
nothing stripped. If we use the normal means of inserting the
original message into the *mail* buffer, headers like Received:
(not really headers, but envelope lines) will be stripped, while
they bear valuable information for us and postmasters. I do wish
that there would be some portable way to write this function, but I
am not aware of any.
Usage:
Place uce.el in your load-path (and optionally byte-compile it).
Add the following line to your init file:
(autoload 'uce-reply-to-uce "uce" "Reply to UCEs" t nil)
If you want to use it with Gnus rather than Rmail:
(setq uce-mail-reader 'gnus)
Options:
uce-message-text is a template that will be inserted into buffer. It has a reasonable default. If you want to write some scarier one, please do so and send it to me. Please keep it polite.
uce-signature behaves just like mail-signature. If nil, nothing is inserted, if t, file ~/.signature is used, if a string, its contents are inserted into buffer.
uce-uce-separator is a line that separates your message from the UCE that you enclose.
uce-subject-line will be used as the subject of the outgoing message.
Defined variables (7)
uce-default-headers | Additional headers to use when responding to a UCE with M-x uce-reply-to-uce. |
uce-mail-reader | A symbol indicating which mail reader you are using. |
uce-message-text | This is the text that ‘uce-reply-to-uce’ command will put in reply buffer. |
uce-setup-hook | Hook to run after UCE rant message is composed. |
uce-signature | Text to put as your signature after the note to UCE sender. |
uce-subject-line | Subject of the message that will be sent in response to a UCE. |
uce-uce-separator | Line that will begin quoting of the UCE. |
Defined functions (2)
uce-insert-ranting | (&optional IGNORED) |
uce-reply-to-uce | (&optional IGNORED) |