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Answered X-Envelope-To: header possible?

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      Friday, February 24, 2012 9:21 PM
       
       
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      Just a quick one. Does anyone know if Exchange 2010 can be configured to add a header to a received email, containing the SMTP recipient address, as X-Envelope-To: or similar? I can't seem to get Mr Google to give me a straight answer.

      Joe

       

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    • Saturday, February 25, 2012 8:21 PM
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      You may be able to do this with a Exchange Transport Rule.

      I have modified headers before using Transport Rules.

      Robert Pearman SBS MVP (2011) | www.titlerequired.com | www.itauthority.co.uk

       

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    • Saturday, February 25, 2012 8:21 PM
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      You may be able to do this with a Exchange Transport Rule.

      I have modified headers before using Transport Rules.

      Robert Pearman SBS MVP (2011) | www.titlerequired.com | www.itauthority.co.uk

       
    • Sunday, February 26, 2012 1:23 PM
       
       
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      Thanks. I did find an article about modifying headers, but it wasn't clear whether new headers could be added. More research..

      Joe

       
    • Sunday, February 26, 2012 3:20 PM
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      I tried this out, there is no obvious 'add header' rule option, but you can use the 'set header with value' option.

      I entered the header as 'rob-custom-header' and set value as 10

       

      You can see from the image, that this seems to work (this message was sent out from the server)

      i did have an image posted in here... one minute..

      Robert Pearman SBS MVP (2011) | www.titlerequired.com | www.itauthority.co.uk



       
    • Sunday, February 26, 2012 8:48 PM
       
       
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      Hi Robert,

      Yes, that's part of the way, but it appears that header values can only be set to literal strings, and not to variables of any kind. So it looks like 'No'. Exchange can add also recipients to the To: header, but again, only literal strings. Possibly a later Exchange will add more flexibility here.

      The reason for the enquiry, by the way, is that the UK ISP Demon Internet is about to switch customer email to Exchange 2010, and until now, Demon customers have had a complete subdomain, with an unrestricted number of recipients, very nearly their own virtual email servers, in fact. Customers will now be able to specify a number of explicit recipients, with anything else going into a catch-all mailbox. The problem is that it will no longer be possible to know the actual recipient in the good old problem situations of BCC and mailing lists, and while most Demon customers have an email client that can pick a recipient out of a variety of headers, that's no good if the recipient is in none of them. Hence the need for X-Envelope-To:, which until now, Demon has added to all received emails. They don't seem able to do so in the new system, and now I know why not.

      Thanks for your time.

      Joe

       
    • Sunday, February 26, 2012 8:59 PM
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      Could you use the POP3 connector on the catchall?

      Robert Pearman SBS MVP (2011) | www.titlerequired.com | www.itauthority.co.uk

       
    • Sunday, February 26, 2012 9:09 PM
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      or set the catch all to forard to a 'standard' demon hosted account that may still have the x-Envelope header?

      Robert Pearman SBS MVP (2011) | www.titlerequired.com | www.itauthority.co.uk

       
    • Sunday, February 26, 2012 9:27 PM
       
       
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      To be honest, nobody is quite sure how the whole thing is being done, and Demon isn't saying much. There appears to be no limit on the number of named recipients, and there certainly can't be separate mailboxes and therefore CALs for all of them. Some people have a few hundred in use, though they won't be naming them all explicitly. There is an additional 'administrator' (virtual) mailbox, which catches anything not for a named recipient. So there is some kind of email pre-processing with recipient mapping, so edge and hub transports are probably used. Customer access is by IMAP4, POP3 or webmail.

      I was hoping to prove that Exchange was able to add the desired header, and therefore that it could be done if Demon could be bothered, but apparently not. It doesn't affect me, I've stayed with Demon since dial-up days because they have clean, fixed IP addresses with proper PTRs for domestic-level prices, but I've run my own mail server with my own domains for at least twelve years.

      Joe

       
    • Sunday, February 26, 2012 9:29 PM
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      Yeah cant really argue with their service TBH.

      Robert Pearman SBS MVP (2011) | www.titlerequired.com | www.itauthority.co.uk

       
    • Monday, February 27, 2012 7:00 AM
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      Hi,

      Glad to know the issue got fixed. Thanks for your time and marking.

      In my opinion, I think you’d better keep the current header information. It included the email routing and information is detailed. We could get benefit from it in the troubleshooting purpose.

      Regards,
      James

      James Xiong

      TechNet Community Support

       
    • Monday, February 27, 2012 9:53 PM
       
       
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      'Settled' rather than 'fixed', but a definite answer is always better than none.

      I wasn't suggesting tampering with existing headers, that should be at least a hanging offence for both programmer and administrator, and I'm a little surprised that Exchange allows adding to the To: header. But a mail server is always allowed to add extra headers, above the existing ones, it just shouldn't touch anything that is already there.

      The issue here is that routing information from the incoming SMTP transaction is being lost, and could be preserved by adding it to the message in the form of extra headers. This facility has been available in most mail servers for at least fifteen years, and Demon customers are accustomed to having it.

      Joe