http://www.perlmonks.org?node_id=38961

I don't know about you, but I use my perlmonks reference quite often: While it's nice to tell them that I'm a perlmonk, I would feel more "official" about it if I could throw 'em an email address like agentm@perlmonks.org. Know what I mean?

In the great tradition of eternally expanding an already humongous website, I propose MonkMail! I can't imagine that we would actually need an online mail reader- that's not at all what I suggest (though if I were to, I would suggest a morph of NeoMail). Since we already have our own thousands of email addresses and seeing that one needs an email address to get an account here, I'd be perfectly happy with a forwarding address mechanism here.

Perhaps these things need to be thought through:

This is what might vroom have had in mind when he wrote something like "the email field may provide some other functionality in the future" on the new user page. What do you guys think?
AgentM Systems nor Nasca Enterprises nor Bone::Easy nor Macperl is responsible for the comments made by AgentM. Remember, you can build any logical system with NOR.

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
(kudra: optional) RE: MonkMail!
by kudra (Vicar) on Oct 29, 2000 at 14:48 UTC
    Obviously quite a few people like this idea, but I see it as another way for spam to reach me. I try to avoid having mail forwarded to me because it bypasses my prefered method of dealing with spam, which is to have the server refuse to accept it (as opposed to filtering later). Also I just don't see the point--if I want mail from someone, I'll give the person my email address (and if I wanted to conceal that, I'd just make a temporary quick account somewhere).

    So I'm opposed to just going through everyone's names. Make it optional and I have no problem with it.

      I STRONGLY agree that this should be optional. last thing merlyn or anymonk needs it "697 news mails from Anonymous_Monk".

      "sometimes when you make a request for the head you don't
      want the big, fat body...don't you go snickering."
                                               -- Nathan Torkington UoP2K a.k.a gnat

(jcwren) RE: MonkMail!
by jcwren (Prior) on Oct 29, 2000 at 07:55 UTC
    This has been discussed several times before, as I best as I can recall. Personally, I like the idea. Dunno what you might do about some of those people with weird characters in their names, other than coerce them to change their nick.

    One thing the search did reveal was something I wasn't aware of (or forgot... Alzhiemers means having new friends every day). Rudimentary Node2Email. This will let you send the contents of a node to an e-mail address.

    --Chris

    e-mail jcwren
      This is a briliant idea. Unfortunately I am one of those people with weird characters in their names :(

      I had problems with the Tk Chatterbox script yesterday and had to make a quick hack to be able to log on.

      I don't mind if I have to change my nick - although I kind of like it.

      There is always the option of a plug-in email service to get started. Such as Everyone.net - Simple change of MX record and addition of CNAME and it's ready to go. However with hundreds of good programmers here maybe we could come up with something better ourselves?

      Just a suggestion. :)

      UPDATE: Did I mention that it's free?
      >Dunno what you might do about some of those people with >weird characters in their names, other than coerce them to >change their nick. Or MIME base 64 encode them :) fastkeys
(redmist) RE: MonkMail!
by redmist (Deacon) on Oct 29, 2000 at 11:47 UTC
    I would kill for an email at Perl Monks. To address all of the issues that you have presented, AgentM:
    1. I think that all users over level three should get to use this feature. The reason I say this is because of the fact that many people register nicks and never come back. I don't think that we want this happening with email addresses.
    2. I think forwarding is certainly adequate.
    3. I believe that the user should be able to change the forwarding address. I see no reason why they should not be allowed to.
    4. I HATE signature advertisements on emails. I would rather pay a monthly fee than deal with signature advertisements (and I would too).


    redmist
    redmist.dyndns.org
    email::redmist
RE: MonkMail!
by ZZamboni (Curate) on Oct 29, 2000 at 08:26 UTC
    I also like the idea, but hadn't dared suggesting it in fear of angrying the all powerful :-) But if it were to be, I agree that a forwarding service would be more than enough. You don't need to use the perlmonks SMTP for sending, as most mail clients allow you to configure what appears as your "From:" address.

    --ZZamboni

RE: MonkMail!
by Petruchio (Vicar) on Oct 29, 2000 at 09:07 UTC
    Hmm... isn't there some law, such that all programs will tend to expand until they can handle email? ;-)

    Well, like many, I've pondered the prospect of MonkMail. But really, I'd just like to have internal mail, with which to communicate with other monks. Leaving /msgs in my chatterbox forever really isn't practical.

    But, as a short-term hack, the chatterbox is a great start. What if, for instance, you had a page which only you could see, but to which many people could write (via a form)? Initially just a pared-down chatterbox page, which received (longer) /msgs, and had a textarea for replies.

    Then, with added features, maybe I could use other pages as subdirectories, so I could organize stuff a little more after the fashion of regular mail. And have an automatic response, or ban certain people, or set a minimum level to send mail to me, etc.

    Personally, I don't feel a need for yet another email account. I wouldn't mind the capability of using it as regular email, but I'd rather not have to, as I'd certainly rather not deal with spam. If I really want to impress people at business meetings, there's always my #!/usr/bin/perl tattoo. ;-)

    Anyway, I think a monks-only mail system would be quick to implement, and really enhance communciations on the site.

      I don't want to sound contrary, but why reinvent the wheel? basically, having a forwarding address @perlmonks.org would let you do what you're suggesting only when someone wanted to leave one of these 'longer /msg's' (which is exactly how i've been thinking about this too), they would just shoot an email to Petruchio@perlmonks.org

      That way vroom does next to no work (add a script that puts an alias in a sendmail config upon a user achieving XYZ status), there's no need for monks to check any extra pages for messages they weren't already and there's no upgrade/enhancement worries on the code side should the monastery have a major overhaul or something (not to say it needs even the slightest tweak, but sometimes you just have to re-write code because it's there : )

      "sometimes when you make a request for the head you don't
      want the big, fat body...don't you go snickering."
                                               -- Nathan Torkington UoP2K a.k.a gnat

        Well, you do sound contrary. Lucky for you this is Perl Monks Discussion, and contrary opinions are pretty well required for interesting discussion. ;-)

        First, I don't want mail from non-monks. Naturally, if I can easily have things this way, I don't care how the system gets implemented on the back end. I would be happy if those monks who wanted @perlmonks.org addresses got them. But email is a commonplace service; monk-only mail would actually be a new service.

        Second, do they have sendmail installed here? I don't know; I know next to nothing about how things are set up behind the scenes here. I'm not sure if they're managing blockstackers.com mail in-house, and if they are, I'm not sure they'd want to mess with it.

        Third, I'd rather see messages from other monks here than elsewhere. I want my PerlMonks stuff here, and other stuff in other places. And I'd prefer not to have to set up some email account, and then configure it so that it rejected all mail except that forwarded from PerlMonks.

        Fourth, I'm not wholly comforted by the thought of people showing up here simply so they can get @perlmonks.org accounts... as seems inevitable.

        Adding the /msg pages I mentioned seem like a very simple hack, which could be expanded in time with options to receive and send external mail, or to forward all mail to an external address. Offering another email address to a bunch of people who probably have a dozen addresses apiece seems more like reinventing the wheel.

        But I say this with all respect for your opinion. :-)

      The Law Of Software Envelopement: Unix programs will expand in features until they are capable of e-mail.

      Of the prototypical examples, I find EMACS and NetHack to be two best.

      --
      $you = new YOU;
      honk() if $you->love(perl)

RE: MonkMail!
by Maclir (Curate) on Oct 30, 2000 at 02:19 UTC
    All I can say, AgentM is you must go to very different places to meet members of the opposite sex. I tried a similar line to yours:
    • as a pickup line ("Did I mention I'm a perlmonk?" -"Your place or mine, hotcakes!")
    and the responses were:
    • three women gave me strange looks and moved to the other side of the bar;
    • two women threw their drinks in my face;
    • one called security and two HUGE bouncers threw me out into the street; and:
    • one woman started some strange chanting - and I moved to the other side of the bar.
    What is your secret? (hotcakes????)
RE: MonkMail!
by jptxs (Curate) on Oct 29, 2000 at 08:48 UTC

    i actually had some CB talks about this recently and didn't even think of simply making it a forward -- that's simply brilliant and very easy to maintain too!

    jptxs is getting all excited just thinking about it : )

    "sometimes when you make a request for the head you don't
    want the big, fat body...don't you go snickering."
                                             -- Nathan Torkington UoP2K a.k.a gnat