A question about procmailrc

[jdow]

From: "Hongwei Li" <hongwei at wustl.edu>

>> On 2/2/2006 12:10 PM, Hongwei Li wrote:
>>
>> [snip]
>>
>>>
>>> The * is a wild char because there are probably other letters after office,
>>> e.g. . ] or space etc.  I also tried:
>>>
>>> :0:
>>> * ^Subject:.*is out of the office*
>>> $MAILDIR/Trash
>>
>> * is not a wild card character.
>>
>> dot is a wild card character.
>>
>> When dot is followed by splat (.*) that means "zero or more anything"
>>
>> So, the above says match on "subject:' starting in column 1
>> followed by any number of characters (zero or more)
>> followed by "is out of the office*"
>>
>> I'm not certain what that last asterisk does....
>> did you try:
>> * ^subject:.*is out of the office.*
>>
>> note the ".*" at the end, and not just "*"
>>
>> Don
>>
> 
> Why does this work when the subject line has many other chars after FAILURE:

That is the way procmail works. Does the search string exist within any
line in the header or body?

> # block junk mails from msnotes:
> :0:
> * ^Subject:.*DELIVERY FAILURE*

Matches ^Subject: DELIVERY FAILUR, ^Subject:  asda asda  DELIVERY FAILUREEEE,
and so forth.

> $MAILDIR/Junk

So that declares the MAILDIR value is defined, at least.

> The real subject is something like:
> DELIVERY FAILURE: 550 5.7.1 Message content rejected...
> 
> I didn't use .*, but only * above.

As an aesthetic thing this might process quicker:
:0 h:
* ^Subject:.*is out of the office
$MAILDIR/Trash

Does $MAILDIR/Trash exist? Is it locked by something else? Is it a directory
or a file? (It should be the same kind of object as "Junk". And the suspicious
mind I have wonders if Trash is a special name for something else that peers
into that directory.)

{^_^}