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Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

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Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#241

Post by drdaeman »

rsync wrote: post #224
sriku wrote: post #150

Not only do dots not matter, you can suffix "+ " to your user name before the "@gmail.com" and it will still come to your email address. I actually love this "+" feature and use it a lot .. like send an email to "+bookmark@gmail.com" to bookmark a link, or register with "+nospam" and setup a filter for that address if anyone sends me email on that. This is supported by icloud and fastmail too.

"This is supported by icloud and fastmail too." No, this is neither supported nor not supported by any email provider - it is part of the email specification. It works that way with all email systems, unless they are non-RFC compliant.

This, to best of my awareness, is not correct.

It is not a part of RFC5322, RFC2822 or RFC822 - nothing in those RFCs establish any particular semantics of local-part (the part before "@"), and in terms of syntax IIRC those RFCs only defines the escaping rules (backslashes, quotes, etc).

RFC5233 mentions the established practice of using a separator character that splits local-part into "user" and "detail" pieces, but does not standardize any particular syntax for the separator (it cites "+" and "#" as possible examples). Moreover, this RFC is about Sieve language, and it is out of its scope to define such standard for email addresses.

RFC3696 mentions "user+mailbox@example.com" but does not define any semantics, merely citing this as an example of a valid email address, then going to how it must be escaped in a mailto: URL.

It is completely up to a particular provider to implement (or not) any subaddressing syntax and any logic related to it. No email specification I'm aware of makes this a requirement. (It's not like I've read every email RFC thoroughly, though, so I could be missing something.)

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#242

Post by RandomBacon »

boring_twenties wrote: post #152
RandomBacon wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I imagine then you've probably gotten receipts/confirmations with the person's phone number. Have you tried calling him and letting him know?

Yeah that's not going to help. I've got a guy using my email address for close to a decade. When it started, he was a high school student ordering lacrosse equipment. More recently he was buying a house -- I received the contract. If my email is foobar@gmail.com, his is foobar7@gmail.com. You'd think 10 years would be enough time to learn the difference, but nope.

That's when you start embarassing the person.

A group of students included my email address in their project discussion. They ignored my emails asking to remove my address. So I started replying as if I was a part of their project, but requested/suggested slightly stupid things. They figured it out real fast after that.

If you have the person's actual email, CC him on all that. If not, include a note saying your a different John Doe and to please remind the John Doe they want to reach, to use his own email address.

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#243

Post by dllthomas »

robbyking wrote: post #172

A coworker of mine got an email once containing important scholarship information intended for a high school kid in Florida. He did a little looking online and found the kid's and his parent's actual email addresses and forwarded the email to them. So here's where it gets weird/dumb: the kid replies to my friend and his parents and says, "hey mom, you put the wrong email address on my application, there's no dot in m…

> you could keep your Gmail address when you moved houses.

In understanding what went wrong here, it's worth noting that historically it was more common to have your email service provided by your ISP. If you moved to a house that wasn't served by the same ISP, your new ISP provided email bundled with the rest of the service at no extra charge, and you didn't want to keep paying to retain your old email, there were circumstances under which a move of house might have motivated a change of email.

Of course this was never relevant to gmail, but it might have been a part of the reason for the confusion. Or it might very well not have.

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#244

Post by miguelrochefort »

I created my Gmail account as firstname.lastname@gmail.com (by mistake), but I always create accounts on website using firstnamelastname@gmail.com.

As a result, I often have problems when communicating by email with companies, as they can't match origin of the email (firstname.lastname@gmail.com) to my account email (firstnamelastname@gmail.com).

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#245

Post by avel »

Santosh83 wrote: post #6

I have been getting financial emails from several people for many years at my GMail ID. They apparently have given my address but without the dot. But what mystifies me is how these people keep going for years without ever realising they aren't getting account transaction emails (from their banks), notifications of stock trades, even OTP emails etc. How is it possible for people to use these services for years withou…

You get financial emails, I got about $1,200 through quickpay / zelle via my email address.

Still waiting for them to contact me at the email _they_ used, to ask for their money back. I have no way of contacting them as the sender info is hidden.

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#246

Post by dllthomas »

fnl wrote: post #233
Negitivefrags wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a common last name and my email is my first initial and my last name. I get so much misdirected mail that I don’t even try to help these people. I hope John gets to his zoom interview for Deputy Chief of Police later today, because I’m not going to tell him about it.

Happens to me all the time, because my name is fairly common. Weird that Google wont "fix" that.

I ... hope Google never tries to fix your name being fairly common.

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#247

Post by miguelrochefort »

jeffbee wrote: post #197
renewiltord wrote: post #190

Someone registered for Facebook with myname@gmail.com. I'd registered with my.name@gmail.com and when I got the email that I'd added the account I clicked yes before reading (that's a mistake you make at most once) and now that guy has a Facebook account I can't log in to and I can't remove this email from the account and I can't remove the notifications either. Part of the reason is that Facebook verifies you're the…

In gmail, open the settings, go to "Accounts", add an address to "Send mail as ..." then you can send mail with as many dots as you like.

Thank you. I had no idea.

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#248

Post by cwkoss »

slartibardfast0 wrote: post #240

I have a first.last@gmail address from the beta, and after numerous misunderstandings I've learned to use very precise language when attempting to help: First establish that they're speaking to the wrong person. Then suggest the nature of their mistake is a simple omission of a letter or number. never offer a 'no big deal' or de-escalation until they've acknowledged the problem, otherwise the real recipient will neve…

Reply with this - people are less likely to argue if they think you are a robot:

This message was created automatically by mail delivery software. A message that you sent has not yet been delivered to one or more of its recipients after more than 24 hours on the queue on mail.example.com.

The message identifier is: 1JYIJ1-0008Ew-JK

The date of the message is:

The address to which the message has not yet been delivered is: .

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#249

Post by BrandoElFollito »

dllthomas wrote: post #243
robbyking wrote: post #172

A coworker of mine got an email once containing important scholarship information intended for a high school kid in Florida. He did a little looking online and found the kid's and his parent's actual email addresses and forwarded the email to them. So here's where it gets weird/dumb: the kid replies to my friend and his parents and says, "hey mom, you put the wrong email address on my application, there's no dot in m…

> you could keep your Gmail address when you moved houses. In understanding what went wrong here, it's worth noting that historically it was more common to have your email service provided by your ISP. If you moved to a house that wasn't served by the same ISP, your new ISP provided email bundled with the rest of the service at no extra charge, and you didn't want to keep paying to retain your old email, there were c…

You will often see people in France who have a @internet.provider address.

The law here is that once you have it, you can keep it when changing providers at no cost, they have to make it available to you.

I always found it weird, especially when you have so much choice of provider-free ones (less in France than in other countries but still)

Re: Dots don't matter in Gmail addresses

#250

Post by SamBam »

Negitivefrags wrote: post #218
robbyking wrote: post #172

A coworker of mine got an email once containing important scholarship information intended for a high school kid in Florida. He did a little looking online and found the kid's and his parent's actual email addresses and forwarded the email to them. So here's where it gets weird/dumb: the kid replies to my friend and his parents and says, "hey mom, you put the wrong email address on my application, there's no dot in m…

I have a common last name and my email is my first initial and my last name. I get so much misdirected mail that I don’t even try to help these people. I hope John gets to his zoom interview for Deputy Chief of Police later today, because I’m not going to tell him about it.

Happens all the time to me. Some of my fellow [first-initial][last-names] are "smart" people -- a professor and a judge, among others -- and I know that they are putting in their own email wrong.

I know this because I'm frequently getting mail from automated systems for something they filled out.

I mean, I know there's an xkcd about this, but seriously? How do you mistype your own email address so often? In both cases, their real addresses are [first-name][last-name].

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