I'm now on the WebNotify list for 3 different servers on several Twiki webs, with the most active being my own one at present... As usage increases and the number of webs increases, the spam level of WebNotify emails is blossoming.

To reduce this it'd be really nice to combine all the reports for an individual user and then send those out. This should be a relatively simple thing to achieve, so I'm proposing to do something like this:

• First of all, go through all the webs on a system and generate a LastNotify.txt file. (That way people who aren't subscribed to the list can see what got sent out and how it differs from the changes link. (Why? It'd be an indication of how "active" the twiki is more than anything)
• Then go through all the web notify pages, to find out who should recieve what - one way of reducing the emails sent would be to recognise that we can:
  1. Get an association of People to Webs:
     JoeBloggs@nibble.com -> Web1, Flooble2, Flibble4, Jibble1
     JosephineBloggs@wibble.com -> Web1,Flibble4, Jibble1
     JackBloggs@bibble.com -> Web1, Flooble2, Jibble1
     JoeBliggs@grrrr.com -> Web1, Flooble2, Flibble4, Jibble1
     JosephineBliggs@arrrgh.com -> Web1,Flibble4, Jibble1
     JackBliggs@Errrrm.com -> Web1, Flooble2, Jibble1
     JoeBluggs@Hmmmm.com -> Web1, Flooble2, Flibble4, Jibble1
     JosephineBluggs@jibble.com -> Web1,Flibble4, Jibble1
     JackBluggs@jabble.com -> Web1, Flooble2, Jibble1

  2. If we flip the RHS with the LHS, sort the new LHS and sort the rows:
     Flooble2,Flibble4,Jibble1,Web1 JoeBloggs@nibble.com
     Flooble2,Flibble4,Jibble1,Web1 -> JoeBluggs@Hmmmm.com
     Flooble2,Flibble4,Jibble1,Web1 -> JoeBliggs@grrrr.com
     Flooble2,Jibble1,Web1 -> JackBloggs@bibble.com
     Flooble2,Jibble1,Web1 -> JackBliggs@Errrrm.com
     Flooble2,Jibble1,Web1 -> JackBluggs@jabble.com
     Flibble4,Jibble1,Web1 -> JosephineBloggs@wibble.com
     Flibble4,Jibble1,Web1 -> JosephineBluggs@jibble.com
     Flibble4,Jibble1,Web1 -> JosephineBliggs@arrrgh.com

  3. Which can clealy be compressed to: Flooble2,Flibble4,Jibble1,Web1 -> { JoeBloggs@nibble.com, JoeBluggs@Hmmmm.com, JoeBliggs@grrrr.com }
     Flooble2,Jibble1,Web1 -> { JackBloggs@bibble.com , JackBliggs@Errrrm.com, JackBluggs@jabble.com }
     Flibble4,Jibble1,Web1 -> { JosephineBloggs@wibble.com, nop>JosephineBluggs@jibble.com, JosephineBliggs@arrrgh.com }

• And then build the reports the obvious way, and send them out.

Locally I'll be writing the above soon for testing...

One other thought - if this LastNotify.txt (or whatever) was publicly visible this raises the possibility of having an agent go out find out what's changed on all the webs you subscribe to, and produce a nice simple single report of all the webs you look at... One nice simple email

-- TWikiGuest - 09 Mar 2001

Good brainstorming idea. But is probably also a matter of taste, e.g. in case implemented should be configurable in the preferences. Some users (me included) use mail filters and prefer the get one notification e-mail per web. This way you see in the subject line if the mail is of urgency or not.

-- PeterThoeny - 10 Mar 2001

I had the same request from users: have a single email for all the webs. The solution I have adopted is described in AllWebsNotify.

-- BrunoFranzini - 18 Jul 2002