Subject: Re: pkgsrc survey
To: None <netbsd-users@NetBSD.org, tech-pkg@NetBSD.org>
From: Tillman Hodgson <tillman@seekingfire.com>
List: tech-pkg
Date: 10/04/2005 21:42:43
On Tue, Oct 04, 2005 at 02:14:26PM -0700, Jeremy C. Reed wrote:
> Please consider installing pkgsrc/pkgtools/pkgsurvey and running it.
> 
> It will email your hostname, your operating system processor and version, 
> and list of your installed packages to an email alias setup by a member of 
> the pkgsrc Project Management Committee.

I gave it a try on 3 hosts this evening. All three had their email
bounced, an example of which follows:

   ----- Transcript of session follows -----                                                                                           
... while talking to uk-mail-b.pkgsrc.org.:                                                                                            
>>> MAIL From:<toor@utu.seekingfire.prv>                                                                                               
<<< 553 sorry, your envelope sender domain must exist (#5.7.1)                                                                         
501 5.6.0 Data format error

These are internal hosts with no local users (one is a KDC, for example)
and they're not set up to masquerade the email domain. It seems like a
poor place to implement that sort of anti-spam measure -- I think you'll
end up missing a lot of potentially reporting hosts. I suspect it would
be much more effective to filter based on the message contents and
formatting (since you control that via pkgsurvey anyway).

I'd like to help with this sort of reporting, I think it's an easy way
for large numbers of pkgsrc-using folks to contribute in a useful
(albeit minor) way. However, it's beyond my personal threshold of
laziness/pain to set up masquerading on the affected hosts. The problem
is entirely on my end, I hasten to assure you, but I suspect that
removing that barrier will help you get the results that you're looking
for.

-T


-- 
"Everything flows and nothing stays."
    -- Heraclitus, quoted in Plato's Cratylus