A mail reply may end up in the wrong category

Support
1

Bonjour,

Here is how to reproduce the behavior on discourse 2.7.9:

  • Create category A with mail a@example.com and category B with mail b@example.com
  • Post a message in category A
  • Reply via email and change the To: so that it is b@example.com
  • The message ends up in category A, as a reply to the original message, instead of category B

This is presumably because the mail headers have information that allow discourse to know this mail was sent as a reply from the original message. So it has to make a choice: should this message be sent to:

  • category B because of the To: field?
  • category A because of the field that identifies it as a reply to a message in category A?

There probably are advantages to both. However, one could argue that landing the message in category B is the least surprising option for the user.

What do you think?

Edit Here is a use case where that could happen:

There was a meeting discussed in a topic in category A. Someone drafted the minutes of the meeting and started a reply via email as a followup to the topic in category A. But then, before sending the reply, they thought best to review the draft with only a few people to reduce the noise. So they changed the To: field to go to category B with less people involved. And they were surprised that the draft ended up in the original conversation in category A instead.

2

But aren’t you replying to a topic, not a category? Or was the diverted reply meant to start a new topic in Category B? (in which case, wouldn’t a fresh email be more intuitive for that)

3

I think it’s fair to assume any kind of unexpected behavior from here on.

2 Likes
4

Yes.

Absolutely, 100% with you.

5

If the new topic you wanted to create had nothing to do with the reply notification you received, I’d say a fresh email makes more sense.

If you’re trying to reply-as-linked-topic via email, then I don’t know how to do that. :slightly_smiling_face: I’m not sure if it’s possible?

1 Like
6

From my perspective (as a technical person), yes. I find it difficult to explain to a non technical person though.

  • What they see is a mail composed with To: b@example.com which is category B.
  • And what they get is a message landing in category A.

There is zero indication in their mail client that would allow them to figure that out.

Moreover, if they do exactly the same in a conversation where discourse is not involved, the result will be different, i.e. the message will only be sent to b@example.com and nobody else.

7

“When you’re replying to an email, you’re not supposed to tinker with the To: field. Don’t do that.”

(Seriously, email clients shouldn’t even allow that. Maybe except for removing one of multiple email addresses in case they were previously added by mistake). EDIT which is exactly your use case :thinking:

2 Likes
8

The use case that made me discover this is the following. There was a meeting discussed in a topic in category A. Someone drafted the minutes of the meeting and started a reply via email as a followup to the topic in category A. But then, before sending the reply, they thought best to review the draft with only a few people to reduce the noise. So they changed the To: field to go to category B with less people involved. And they were surprised that the draft ended up in the original conversation in category A instead.

This is not a bizarre scenario, it actually makes sense to me. And their surprise is not really something that I can discard: I understand it.

1 Like