Lumen truncates email messages (with inline quotes)

[wu-lee]

Problem: I just had my entire message deleted, and all that remained was the discussion history! This seems to be a new problem but experienced similar problems in the past. I also isn't just happening to me, empty posts are not unusual. I understand the reason for the "Reply above the line" header is to de-duplicate quoted replies to the web forum. However, the mechanism it serves does need to be careful to delete the right things, if it has to delete anything.

My request: at the very least, please make sure Lumen trims its own content carefully, and allows inline quotes.

I include these quotes for good reason: because of the way that Lumen's threads are flattened, in my mail client (and the web UI) each reply looks like it refers to the last post to arrive. You may think you are replying to the last post, but someone can get a reply in first. Without the right context, misunderstandings are all too easy. For example, in the discussion in question, someone mistook a previous post appended to my (empty!) reply as mine, and responded accordingly! Also I frequently find myself puzzling what is meant by a Lumen post, because it appears in my mail client's thread in order of arrival time rather than following the post which prompted it.

Version of Lumen: I do not know how to tell what version is running, so I cannot tell if it has been upgraded recently (see #16). I access it via net.positivemoney.org. From the domain emails originate from (lumen.wordsandwriting.me), I would guess it runs on one of the author's servers.

Case in point: What appears to happen is that Lumen sees my inline quote as the beginning of the discussion history it pasted into the original email, and removes it and everything after. Except this quote was the one inserted by my mail client when replying, and I was careful to remove the lines Lumen inserted to avoid confusion, i.e. those starting "Respond by replying above this line". I believe this used to work.

My reply email looked something like this:

On 02/11/15 10:09, Redacted wrote:
>  Their redacted text here

My redacted reply here

The resulting message mailed back to subscribers had nothing from my mail in it, just the discussion history. My second attempt to reply deliberately included some text before the header to see if that remained:

My redacted reply here

On 02/11/15 10:09, Redacted wrote:
> Their redacted text here

More of my redacted reply here

It did: just the first part of my reply above the quote appeared, followed as usual by the discussion history.

The specific examples I have may be visible to you if you do run the Lumen instance in question. Selected headers from the first mail I sent:

To: [email protected]
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Date: Mon, 2 Nov 2015 11:09:40 +0000
In-Reply-To: <5637365d12ee2_33fe96eadb3e87565e@14b461bf-dc3e-48be-9d2f-1fcc787f9d2f.mail>

The resulting post which got mailed out:

Date: Mon, 02 Nov 2015 11:12:51 +0000
Sender: [email protected]
Message-ID: <563745332c1ea_33fb9f67c2ff0748ef@fbec26b1-0355-40a6-99c9-c81388f5b5ab.mail>
In-Reply-To: <5637365d12ee2_33fe96eadb3e87565e@14b461bf-dc3e-48be-9d2f-1fcc787f9d2f.mail>

My second attempt:

To: [email protected]
Message-ID: <[email protected]>
Date: Mon, 2 Nov 2015 11:09:40 +0000
In-Reply-To: <5637365d12ee2_33fe96eadb3e87565e@14b461bf-dc3e-48be-9d2f-1fcc787f9d2f.mail>

And the post which got sent out:

Date: Mon, 02 Nov 2015 13:56:29 +0000
Sender: [email protected]
Message-ID: <56376b8d172ea_33f8cc6b8f0f08699b@b934a694-4809-41b4-af84-c533af1254d3.mail>
In-Reply-To: <563745332c1ea_33fb9f67c2ff0748ef@fbec26b1-0355-40a6-99c9-c81388f5b5ab.mail>

And an example of another's empty post in the previous thread, just to show it's not just me!

 Date: Fri, 30 Oct 2015 14:56:32 +0000
 Sender: [email protected]
 To: [email protected]
 Message-ID: <56338520a79e9_33f8060c56d98105439@20bb73a0-cf92-4df4-ac66-383e04d1e844.mail>
 In-Reply-To: <56335158841ed_33fd576531958660a5@88b46679-e150-4756-a618-cbe8ae9303c4.mail>