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Basic version is anything that can look at a logfile of a webserver. Each mail gets a specific URL for the image, HTTP request to there turns up in the log.

Or you put some kind of server side app on the server that tracks the request in its own log.

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Is the HTTP request for the image or for a blank page? I'm just guessing here, but I guess a new file is created each time an email is created and then a reference to who the email is sent to is stored in a DB somewhere?

something that isn't an image might show up on the page, even if only 1x1 px big, so it's "cleaner" to send an empty gif or something. Doesn't have to be a new file for everybody though -> one could simply redirect everything to one file, or put the metadata in an URL parameter.

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