# Hello, my name is JQWLKCE, you mangled my email, prepare to die. **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 15, 2005, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hello-my-name-is-jqwlkce-you-mangled-my-email-prepare-to-die/290266 "2005-02-15T22:11:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Earthling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/90db22/32.png) [@Earthling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earthling)\ **Post date:** [February 15, 2005, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hello-my-name-is-jqwlkce-you-mangled-my-email-prepare-to-die/290266/1 "2005-02-15T22:11:49Z")
A couple of questions on email reply headers. First, as the thread title indicated, I’ve noticed that sometimes when I reply to emails, the original sender’s address block gets mangled so that it appears as _WROM: SMIUOEVQIWEJGKL To: Somebody Sent: Some date Subject: Whatever_ The “F” in “From:” is always replaced by “W,” but the address itself is replaced by an apparently random collection of capital letters, which doesn’t map consistently to any email address. I’ve seen this happen in both Outlook Express and when using Hotmail on the web (yes, I realize the error of my ways…). Has anyone else noticed this? Why does this happen? Second, to rectify my errors, I’ve now gotten a Gmail account and am using Thunderbird as the front-end on my PC. One behavior I’ve seen with both Gmail on the web and Thunderbird (all my POP accounts, not just Gmail) is that when replying to a message, the sender’s text is simply headed by (roughly) _On some-date, So-and-so wrote:_ The slight difference being that Gmail shows both the originator’s name and email address, and Thunderbird just show’s the person’s name. My correspondents with Yahoo mail also show this shortened header for my originals, but I don’t know whether they use Yahoo on the web or with a PC front-end. So, is this a new trend, to simplify reply headers? Or is it just another style that I’m not used to? ---
**Author:** ![Earthling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/90db22/32.png) [@Earthling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earthling)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2005, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hello-my-name-is-jqwlkce-you-mangled-my-email-prepare-to-die/290266/2 "2005-02-16T17:10:08Z")
So…did I get everyone stumped? OK, one bump. ---
**Author:** ![SpaceDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spacedog/32/9932_2.png) [@SpaceDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SpaceDog)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2005, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hello-my-name-is-jqwlkce-you-mangled-my-email-prepare-to-die/290266/3 "2005-02-16T17:31:43Z")
> [@Earthling](#): > > So, is this a new trend, to simplify reply headers? Or is it just another style that I’m not used to? If I understand your question then the answer is both, kinda. When you reply the format of the headers in the message-body is irrelavent it just shows what you’re replying to. So previously programs copied the only replied-to message in headers-and-all. This took up several lines and contained infromation that might not be important. This means that if you add your reply before the original text (rather than after or interspersed) there would be a be big header block between the reply and what your were replying to. Newer programs distill the important information down to one line to make life easier. You can always copy in other header information if you want. I suspect the format of that line is born from Usenet conventions but I could be wrong. This might also explain the change from Outlook/Hotmail which use a windowsy style, to GMail/Thunderbird which are more Linux/Unixy in style. As to the mangled headers, I dunno, but I’ll guess. It looks like something is overwriting the header text, perhaps something needed some ‘working space’ to do some process and it used the header line to do it. That’s possible as the From line is pretty much just there for information. But it could be anything doing it, but if it happens on both a webbased system and outlook then I’m not sure what’s in common. Maybe a badly behaved virus scanning system somewhere ? SD ---
**Author:** ![flight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbce88/32.png) [@flight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/flight)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2005, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hello-my-name-is-jqwlkce-you-mangled-my-email-prepare-to-die/290266/4 "2005-02-16T17:32:23Z")
Don’t know about the frontend for gmail, but they have a standard of limiting the header info. The full header can be viewed by hitting a button. Does your frontend give you this option? ---
**Author:** ![Earthling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/90db22/32.png) [@Earthling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earthling)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2005, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hello-my-name-is-jqwlkce-you-mangled-my-email-prepare-to-die/290266/5 "2005-02-16T17:57:35Z")
> [@flight](#): > > Don’t know about the frontend for gmail, but they have a standard of limiting the header info. The full header can be viewed by hitting a button. Does your frontend give you this option? I think you may have misunderstood (or I may have not made myself clear). I have no problems seeing headers on incoming mail, it’s just that when I reply, in the past I’ve seen an extended (and mangled) address block, and now I’m seeing the abbreviated (Usenet style?) address line. ---
**Author:** ![Futile\_Gesture](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f05b48/32.png) [@Futile\_Gesture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Futile_Gesture)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2005, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hello-my-name-is-jqwlkce-you-mangled-my-email-prepare-to-die/290266/6 "2005-02-16T20:10:48Z")
Have you got Symantec installed? Do you have Internet Privacy switch on? Turn it off. [Info here](http://groups.google.co.uk/groups?selm=eNI8RVb8DHA.2540%40TK2MSFTNGP11.phx.gbl) ---
**Author:** ![Earthling](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/90db22/32.png) [@Earthling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Earthling)\ **Post date:** [February 16, 2005, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hello-my-name-is-jqwlkce-you-mangled-my-email-prepare-to-die/290266/7 "2005-02-16T21:37:20Z")
Aha! Thanks, that must be it. Yes, I do have Norton Internet Security, and I’m not willing to turn it off. But since I’ve now switched accounts, mangled emails apparently won’t be a problem any more.