I wonder why they don’t use the terminology from the RFCs: "reject", "defer", 
"non-delivery notification", "delay notification"? 

As it is, when you say "Hardbounce", I don’t know whether you’re referring to 
an SMTP 5yz reply (a rejection) by the receiving MTA or an rfc 3461 "failed" 
DSN sent to the sender to alert them to the problem. 

Similarly, I don’t know whether "softbounces" means an rfc5321 temporary 
failure reply , or an rfc 3461 "delayed" DSN. Neither of which mean quite what 
you said, since the intention is that the sending MTA will retry for a period. 
The sending MTA can’t use other means. If the original sender tries again, then 
the recipient will get duplicate messages when the fault is resolved.  

If the ESP is good, the the sender will have access to a support team, so all 
faults should be actionable.


> On 11 Dec 2015, at 11:59, David Hofstee <da...@mailplus.nl> wrote:
> 
> That’s why, in ESP parlance, there are two sorts of bounces, to keep it 
> simple:
> -          Hardbounces: The recipient address does not work. Contact through 
> other means.
> -          Softbounces: This email did not arrive. Try again later or contact 
> through other means. If this keeps happening  the address effectively does 
> not work. 
>  
> What else is there to do? The sender might be curious to what the reason is 
> (if the bounce is even telling you that) but it does not change the outcome 
> or the call to action. The only things that are actionable for a sender, in a 
> message, is when the content gets unacceptable (spam, too big). 
>  
> We have about 30 categories to explain what type of error occurred (available 
> on request). 
>  
> Met vriendelijke groet,
>  
>  
> David Hofstee
> Deliverability Management
> MailPlus B.V. Netherlands (ESP)
>  
> Van: mailop [mailto:mailop-boun...@mailop.org] Namens Brandon Long
> Verzonden: donderdag 10 december 2015 22:23
> Aan: Dave Warren
> CC: mailop
> Onderwerp: Re: [mailop] Delivery to gmail via IPv6
>  
> I was just discussing this issue with our support folks, and we're looking at 
> improving ours for this reason.  We also see a remarkable number of our NDRs 
> marked as spam, especially by those whose primary language isn't English.
>  
> We'll definitely still include the technical information, but it'll be 
> further down.
>  
> And we'll do our best with handling the remote server's error messages, but 
> ugh.  It's too bad that the extended status codes are still so generic... 
> though, as our tech writer and ux folks pointed out, really, all the user 
> cares about is "did I do something wrong? Is there something else I can do?"
>  
> Brandon
>  
> On Thu, Dec 10, 2015 at 12:18 PM, Dave Warren <da...@hireahit.com> wrote:
> And unfortunately the friendlier they are, the less useful they usually are.
> 
> The ugly ones are the only ones that are useful, but for whatever reason, 
> it's beyond MTA developers to start with friendly messages with a 
> "Troubleshooting information below" that contains a useful transcript.
> 
> As a techie, I appreciate the info, but the reality is that unless you expect 
> the sender to take some action, transient error messages aren't usually 
> useful. We've scaled back the transient failures that we send, at most you 
> get a single transient and single permanent error, and even still, I question 
> the value of the transient error since the user can't actually do anything 
> (and nor does forwarding it to support@ help). Of course, we also allow users 
> to view the SMTP queue for all messages involving their account for those who 
> care, so that might skew my viewpoint.
> 
> I'm not a fan of the current trend of using permanent error codes in SMTP for 
> what might well be transient errors (DNS problems, for example), but at the 
> same time, as a sender, I don't see any value in retrying more than 24 hours.
> 
> It's tough to balance user expectations though.
> 
> -- 
> Dave Warren
> http://www.hireahit.com/
> http://ca.linkedin.com/in/davejwarren
> 
> On 2015-12-10 10:43, Franck Martin wrote:
> It also has to do with people not understanding DSN. Seriously they are ugly 
> and hard to find the relevant information in them...
> 
> 
> 
> 
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-- 
Ian Eiloart
Postmaster, University of Sussex
+44 (0) 1273 87-3148

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