[leafnode-list] Re: message id goes by FQDN or e-mail address?

[Adam Funk]

On 2006-09-23, Matthias Andree <matthias.andree at gmx.de> wrote:

> The question isn't what will go wrong in leafnode (nothing should), but
> if newsreaders generate the MID properly.
>
> Newsreaders that strip the local part from the mail address and use that
> for the Message-ID generate IDs that are always on the brink of
> collision which would cause disappearing articles (not a leafnode
> problem though, but a newsreader problem) - and if you think that can't
> happen, please check existing literature for the birthday paradoxon to
> see that it's not at all unlikely that two identical Message-IDs are
> generated - particularly for short Message-IDs or IDs with little
> entropy, say, UNIX second-resolution timestamp and a counter would
> probably be insufficient.

Hmm.  I don't know why that bit of slrn-configuration was marked as
leafnode-specific.

According to the docs, slrn's MIDs consist 'of the string "slrn",
time, process id, user- and hostname'.  To me that sounds reasonable,
but I've got a working system and no motivation to try to break
it.   :-) 

Thanks for the information.