[thelist] HTML e-mail tracking

[Shaun Anderson]

I know that this subject isn't going to make me any friends ( ;-) ) but I've
been tasked with figuring out how to track who opens an HTML e-mail campaign
that we're sending out.

I know about the 1 px x 1 px web bugs, but I've also heard from my boss
about some sort of function (which she described as "HTML open") that would
also track who opened the e-mails.  She heard about this from the people who
are actually going to send the e-mail for us (a rented list that's opt-in,
and market specific).

I know nothing about this.  It sounds like Javascript to me, but that
doesn't really make any sense to me either.  I don't know that many people
who have JavaScript enabled in their e-mail client.

Is there something in the header that could be used to track this? How
reliable might it be?

Another issue that I've been asked to research is how to track what e-mail
clients people are using.  I know that this information is usually kept in
the header (if it's sent).  Could this somehow be tracked in conjunction
with a web bug?

Thanks,
Shaun