PGP: sequencing messages

Steve Lamb pmmail@rpglink.com
Wed, 5 Apr 2000 09:36:15 -0700


Wednesday, April 05, 2000, 9:21:05 AM, Trevor wrote:
> I still don't understand how this is a bug. How could PMMail/2
> possibly know what unique message id to assign to an outgoing
> message? My understanding was that the message id had to be unique
> across the whole Internet. No?

    Yes, it does.  I knows by doing the exact same thing every other agent
(MUA, MTA, etc) does, generates it from a mix of random and static elements.
There is no central repository of MSGIDs which are handed out to MSGs when
needed.  Every single one is generated.

    Let's take my two mailers MSGIDs as examples.

Message-ID: <7469.000329@rpglink.com>

    This one is The Bat!'s.  How it comes up with the number sequence is
beyond me, really.  Needless to say that each MSGID from The Bat! is pretty
much unique.  I mean the rpglink.com pretty much assures that any TB!'s
running elsewhere will not match, even if the number sequence somehow is
duplicated.  A few more from me:

Message-ID: <1359.000405@rpglink.com>
Message-ID: <6353.000405@rpglink.com>
Message-ID: <12338.000405@rpglink.com>

    Ah, the one after the . is the date (YYMMDD).

Message-ID: <20000221183930.A24637@rpglink.com>

    Here is mutt one.  The first part of the numerical sequence looks like
YYYYMMDDhhmmss.  After that is what appears to be a random sequence and then
another static string.  Pretty unique to me.  :)



-- 
         Steve C. Lamb         | I'm your priest, I'm your shrink, I'm your
         ICQ: 5107343          | main connection to the switchboard of souls.
-------------------------------+---------------------------------------------