Spamassassin doesn't like DEAR_EMAIL in calendar notifications

ℹ️ Support
1

I’ve been testing out nextcloud calendar’s “meeting proposals” feature, and am really liking it! One thing I noticed however is that the email notifications are landing in spam for one of my test email addresses.

I did a mail-tester.com test and was informed that the email was just about perfect (8.7/10) but the “Dear foo@bar” heading was flagged by spamassassin, docking 1.499 points:

-1.499 DEAR_EMAIL Message contains Dear email address
-0.1 DKIM_SIGNED Message has a DKIM or DK signature, not necessarily valid
This rule is automatically applied if your email contains a DKIM signature but other positive rules will also be added if your DKIM signature is valid. See immediately below.
0.1 DKIM_VALID Message has at least one valid DKIM or DK signature
Great! Your signature is valid
0.1 DKIM_VALID_AU Message has a valid DKIM or DK signature from author’s domain
Great! Your signature is valid and it’s coming from your domain name
0.1 DKIM_VALID_EF Message has a valid DKIM or DK signature from envelope-from domain
-0.001 HTML_MESSAGE HTML included in message
No worry, that’s expected if you send HTML emails
-0.001 SPF_HELO_NONE SPF: HELO does not publish an SPF Record
0.001 SPF_PASS SPF: sender matches SPF record
Great! Your SPF is valid

It also flagged some other small issues:

  • html is weighty - only 10% of the message content is actual text
  • no list-unsubscribe header

My personal feeling is that the notifications are indeed a bit heavy on html just for a calendar notification. The template could be redesigned to be simpler, free of html and less clunky.

And yes, the “Dear foo@bar, a proposed meeting has been updated” does come across as spammy, especially if the recipient has never seen it before which is possible given this can be sent to an external email address being invited to a nextcloud calendar event.

2

Hi Tobias,

That’s a very well-written analysis.
I’ve never used that feature before. Is it part of the standard Calendar app, or is it a separate one?

An issue on GitHub would be more appropriate for this than posting here, since the developers work through the issues on GitHub.

Best regards

3

Mail-tester.com is a separate tool. I really recommend it!

Can you signpoint for me how to give product feedback on github? I am not so familiar with how nextcloud uses github.. having been product manager for Discourse in the past I am accustomed to the discourse community also being a good place to give feedback and to discuss improvements, between developers and end users like me. I wish it were the same here! Oftentimes a request for help is actually product feedback.

4

I wasn’t referring to Mail Tester, but to the Nextcloud feature “meeting proposals.” I want to point you to the related repo at GH, but I am not sure where the feature comes from.

Nearly all developers of NC use GitHub, and the forum is intended for individual users and small businesses.

I see the difference compared to Discourse, since there the forum is actually the product itself.
It’s different here, and there’s the Nextcloud Talk instance (which you’re already familiar with).

Das stimmt.

5

Oh, ok - I think it’s just part of the calendar. See the docs: Using the Calendar app — Nextcloud latest User Manual latest documentation

OK, I will see if I can rewire my brain. I am not a developer but I can talk to developers, so should be willing to engage on github and will make every effort to do so.

I see so many areas where improvements can be made around the edges, like this DEAR_EMAIL thing.

Yes, we are all dogfooding our own products! :rofl:

I’ve had to bookmark that nextcloud talk instance because I keep forgetting how to find my way back there.