On Mon, Apr 20, 2020 at 10:53:47AM -0500, David Wright wrote:
Oh, this was explicitly about Thunderbird's ":exec bounce-message"? I missed that bit, sorry for that. Will re-read.
If this is so, then : must be an active character in order to introduce the string "exec". I see no mention of : in that role on https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/keyboard-shortcuts so we need some clarification.
It's always seemed futile to me to bounce an entire message back to the sender: after all, they sent it, they know what was in it, and have probably retained a copy (if it's non-trivial). its usefulness if you work within a group of cooperating colleagues, where each is taking responsibility for different aspects.
Otherwise, forwarding seems more appropriate and polite. But there are two forms of fowarding (at least in mutt): as a separate attachment, or as part of your own email (like with top-posting). In the latter case (with mutt), you can see that you're only forwarding whichever parts of the original header that you were displaying at the time.
I think I misspoke, saying "Thunderbird" rather than "neo-mutt"; the ":exec bounce-message" is the way to BOUNCE in neo-mutt, not in Thunderbird. Forgive me. BOUNCE also is termed REDIRECT. To REDIRECT in Thunderbird, it appears necessary to install a plug-in. As I understand it, BOUNCING or REDIRECTION relays a message in the most pristine form available, preserving the header, whereas FORWARDING allows you to make changes to the message. This is (or should be) true, irrespective of the mail user agent. I cannot speak with authority regarding the difference between REPLY and FORWARD. If I receive spam and wish to report it to my ISP, I BOUNCE the message, so as not to disturb the "evidence" or "scene of the crime". Likewise, a message which may be criminial in nature (threat, extortion, pornography), should be BOUNCED to law enforcement and to the ISP, to facilitate tracing. A message may be BOUNCED or FORWARDED to anyone, including the sender (unless the sender has used a fictitious address, which typically is the case with malicious messages). Neo-mutt documentation led me to believe that there is a "b" command (or something of the sort) for BOUNCE; but I did not find it, perhaps because I use the "Classic Dvorak" keymap. I then discovered that commands not tied to a key can be executed with ":exec <commandname>". RLH