Use of the Tracking URL

[Wazoo]

For starters, click here to read what a Tracking URL actually is SpamCop Glossary (should open in a new window)

When posting for help here or in the newsgroups (news://news.spamcop.net) it is much preferred that you use the Tracking URL to demonstrate the issue/problem with your spam (submittal) ... though it is known that at times the spam is so screwed up that the parser dies too quickly, if the Tracking URL is made available, please use it.

Why use it? This Forum application doesn't care for white space, so what you type in may not look anything like how the next person in sees it on screen. Your e-mail / newsreader application may be the culprit in manipulating things, so that the "real" same data might not show up between your copying data off of one screen and pasting it into another screen/application. What you think you submitted isn't what the parser saw. The person that might have the answer has his/her system set-up differently, so your 179 character long lines are broken up into 68 character lines on his/her screen, leaving things close to impossible to read through. Some folks like to ask about three lines of something from a particular e-mail, but to talk about those three lines, one must know what another 15 lines of data said elsewhere, so without the "total" package, discussion on those three lines is probably wasting everyon's time. These are just a few of the reasons to use the Tracking URL if it's made available.

You are on the SpamCop parsing output page, whether from a paste-your-spam-in-the-box action on "your" www.spamcop.net web page or from the resulting "your report is ready" e-mail from an e-mailed submittal.

1. Right click on that long string of characters identified as "your Tracking URL" ...(as this is the same URL as the exact page that you are viewing, one could also copy the web-page address showing in the browser address bar) ... if the entire string of characters doesn't highlight, then you will have to "select the entire string of characters" . usually by dragging the mouse from one end to the other with the laft mouse button depressed, releasing the mouse button at the end of the test string (speaking Windows here) .. then right-click on the highlighted text string.

2. Select the "copy Shortcut" if available ... "copy" if you had to manually grab the text string ... this will place that data on your (Windows) clipboard.

3. Start your Forum or newsgroup post, and when you get to where it's needed, right-click in thatposting and select "Paste" which should bring that 'stored' URL from the clipboard and put it into the posting. Whne you have you query typed in, submit your post and hopefully the next thing you see will be something to answer the riddle <g>