does Mail generate read receipts?

[animatedude]

i'm disappointed with the new Outlook 2011 that it doesn't have a read receipts.is there anyways to generate read receipts on outlook 2011? if not does Mail on Mac have this feature? or is there anyway to have this feature?

[Hellhammer]

Unfortunately, Mail does not support it

[nelz886]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8B117 Safari/6531.22.7)

hopefully in the next build :-/

[FourCandles]

Thunderbird handles and generates read receipts, if that's of any use.

[animatedude]

is there ANYWAY i can generate read receipts or delivery receipts in Mail or Outlook 2011?

[MisterMe]

Originally Posted by animatedude

is there ANYWAY i can generate read receipts or delivery receipts in Mail or Outlook 2011?

Read receipts are an artifact of a bygone era. They were a feature of AOL. Other systems duplicated the feature, but it tends not to work across domains. That is just as well.

Send a message. Your receipt(s) will either read it or not. The only thing that a receipt can tell you is that the message was opened by the recipient. It cannot tell you whether or not the messages was read. Your recipient denies receiving your message. Your receipt says that he/she did. What are you going to do about it?

[miles01110]

Originally Posted by animatedude

is there ANYWAY i can generate read receipts or delivery receipts in Mail or Outlook 2011?

If you're in an Exchange server environment you can do it with Outlook, but otherwise read MisterMe's explanation on why read receipts are completely pointless.

[animatedude]

Originally Posted by miles01110

If you're in an Exchange server environment you can do it with Outlook, but otherwise read MisterMe's explanation on why read receipts are completely pointless.

yes dude i'm in exchange server environment.it used to work for me on Outlook on windows but there's no options of that on Outlook 2011 for MAC.any idea how to do that?

[miles01110]

Actually, upon further investigation it seems Outlook 2011 doesn't support DNRs.

[Weaselboy]

Originally Posted by miles01110

If you're in an Exchange server environment you can do it with Outlook, but otherwise read MisterMe's explanation on why read receipts are completely pointless.

I certainly understand the limitations, but I would hardly call it "completely pointless." It at least tells me the recipient got the message rather than sidetracked as spam or in their junk folder. Might not be something you want to want to take to a court of law, but it is not pointless.

[miles01110]

Originally Posted by Weaselboy

I certainly understand the limitations, but I would hardly call it "completely pointless." It at least tells me the recipient got the message rather than sidetracked as spam or in their junk folder. Might not be something you want to want to take to a court of law, but it is not pointless.

Well, we could argue about it I suppose- but what's the difference between ending up in the spam folder vs. "clicked on and subsequently ignored" ?

[Weaselboy]

Originally Posted by miles01110

Well, we could argue about it I suppose- but what's the difference between ending up in the spam folder vs. "clicked on and subsequently ignored" ?

Kind of like the signature I get on a UPS Package. At least I know you got the information. If you ignored it, that's on you. Your comment that this is completely pointless was an exaggeration and you know it.

[robbieduncan]

Originally Posted by Weaselboy

I certainly understand the limitations, but I would hardly call it "completely pointless." It at least tells me the recipient got the message rather than sidetracked as spam or in their junk folder. Might not be something you want to want to take to a court of law, but it is not pointless.

Not if you send email to me (at work where we have Outlook/Exchange). I have it set to ask me before sending read receipts and I deny each and every one.

[miles01110]

Originally Posted by Weaselboy

Kind of like the signature I get on a UPS Package. At least I know you got the information. If you ignored it, that's on you. Your comment that this is completely pointless was an exaggeration and you know it.

How does one "get the information" if it is ignored? You are contradicting yourself. Read receipts are pointless, and only serve to comfort the insecure.

[Weaselboy]

Originally Posted by miles01110

How does one "get the information" if it is ignored? You are contradicting yourself. Read receipts are pointless, and only serve to comfort the insecure.

Now you are just being obtuse. I'm done.

[seh]

Originally Posted by MisterMe

Read receipts are an artifact of a bygone era. They were a feature of AOL. Other systems duplicated the feature, but it tends not to work across domains.

I sure hope you don't work in writing standards or their implementation, as your understanding here is poor. Read the MDN RFC. It has been around since 1998, and has nothing to do with AOL, "systems", or domains. It can work perfectly between any two willing MUAs.

[MisterMe]

Originally Posted by seh

I sure hope you don't work in writing standards or their implementation, as your understanding here is poor. Read the MDN RFC. It has been around since 1998, and has nothing to do with AOL, "systems", or domains. It can work perfectly between any two willing MUAs.

It appears that you didn't read your own link. First off, AOL had receipts in the early 1990's--nearly a decade prior to 1998. The whole point of the Message Deposition Notification protocol was to develop an Internet standard that generalized the AOL-type "LAN-based" receipt protocols. Far from having nothing to do with MDN, AOL was the inspiration and motivation for it.

This, however, does not change the fact that the MDN RFC was a pointless exercise. The proof of its futility is that so few developers have chosen to implement it.

[seh]

Originally Posted by MisterMe

AOL had receipts in the early 1990's--nearly a decade prior to 1998.

I understand that; I too was an AOL user way back then. However, I don't see any evidence that MDN was based on AOL's idea or implementation. Can you cite a source that makes that claim?

I use three email client programs that generate request and reply to such requests, so I don't think it's as obvious of a failure as you say. My contention with your original comment was that it suggested that the support for MDN needs to be cooked into a closed email "system", or brokered between such systems, which is not the case.

Again, are you claiming that its adoption failed because it's a bad idea, or because it's hard to implement, or because no one wants to use it? The OP in this thread is clearly pining for it.

[animatedude]

Originally Posted by robbieduncan

Not if you send email to me (at work where we have Outlook/Exchange). I have it set to ask me before sending read receipts and I deny each and every one.

which one are you using? Entourage?

[robbieduncan]

Originally Posted by animatedude

which one are you using? Entourage?

We have PCs at work. We're using Outlook. 2007 I think

[GGJstudios]

Regardless of where read receipts originated and which apps support them, they're not effective in determining if someone read your message. There are several possibilities as to why you wouldn't receive a read receipt:

• The email never was delivered, in which case you may or may not receive a failed delivery notice.
• The email was delivered to a spam or junk folder and was never seen.
• The email was delivered to an inbox, but was never opened.
• The email was delivered and opened, but the recipient blocked the return of a receipt.

In any event, the only time they work is if you actually get one back, and even then, it only means the email was opened, not that it was read or understood.

[funkahdafi]

Originally Posted by miles01110

How does one "get the information" if it is ignored? You are contradicting yourself. Read receipts are pointless, and only serve to comfort the insecure.

they may be pointless to you, but that does not make it pointless for everyone else. it's not like your opinion is the center of the universe or something.

[miles01110]

Originally Posted by funkahdafi

they may be pointless to you, but that does not make it pointless for everyone else. it's not like your opinion is the center of the universe or something.

I didn't state that my opinion is the center of the universe's. I was merely pointing out a contradiction in another member's already weak argument.

Do you have anything to add to the discussion about read receipts, or are you done playing online moral policeman?

Simple truth: If read receipts were useful, more e-mail clients, servers, and/or protocols would support them. That's the nice thing about capitalism- if something is not worth the time (and money) to include in a software suite, it doesn't get put in. Not sure how you plan on making the case for read receipts since hardly anyone uses them in a meaningful way, but you're welcome to keep trying.

[funkahdafi]

Originally Posted by miles01110

I didn't state that my opinion is the center of the universe's. I was merely pointing out a contradiction in another member's already weak argument.

Do you have anything to add to the discussion about read receipts, or are you done playing online moral policeman?

Simple truth: If read receipts were useful, more e-mail clients, servers, and/or protocols would support them. That's the nice thing about capitalism- if something is not worth the time (and money) to include in a software suite, it doesn't get put in. Not sure how you plan on making the case for read receipts since hardly anyone uses them in a meaningful way, but you're welcome to keep trying.

your attitude is more than unpleasent.

not sure which planet you live on, down here on earth, most mailservers and clients I know support receipts. and I know a lot, being in the IT consulting business sine 1994.

that being said I am not arguing whether or not those receipts are pointless. a lot of people are using them one way or another, so who are you to tell them they are pointless? it's your opinion, nothing more.

not sure what you are trying to prove here. that you are some sort of genius who's trying to make his own way of thinking a rule for other's?

there are people out there that make use of mail receipts, there are products that support it, so it can't be all the pointless, at least to them. get over it.

[MisterMe]

Originally Posted by seh

I understand that; I too was an AOL user way back then. However, I don't see any evidence that MDN was based on AOL's idea or implementation. Can you cite a source that makes that claim?

I actually said "AOL-like," but it is just as well. From RFC 3798:

Abstract
.... The purpose is to extend Internet Mail to support functionality often found in other messaging systems, such as X.400 and the proprietary "LAN-based"systems, and often referred to as "read receipts," "acknowledgements", or "receipt notifications." ...

It is interesting that each poster who uses an MDN-enabled mail application uses a version of Microsoft Outlook. Outlook is no less proprietary than AOL.

Originally Posted by seh

I use three email client programs that generate request and reply to such requests, so I don't think it's as obvious of a failure as you say.

Which three email clients do you use?

Originally Posted by seh

My contention with your original comment was that it suggested that the support for MDN needs to be cooked into a closed email "system", or brokered between such systems, which is not the case.

You might have a point if you could show that an email developer has successfully implemented the RFC 3798 standard for MDN.

Originally Posted by seh

Again, are you claiming that its adoption failed because it's a bad idea, or because it's hard to implement, or because no one wants to use it?

All of the above.

Originally Posted by seh

The OP in this thread is clearly pining for it.

There is one in every crowd.