RE: Last Call: SMTP Message Submission to Proposed Standard

[Chris Newman <Chris.Newman@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Let me try to make this very simple.  We have two choices:

a) Declare a separate port for submission at the same time we deploy SMTP
authentication.  Then add submit-only extensions for new functionality.

b) The submit port is always port 25 unless someone manually reconfigures
the server and all clients at a site.  There will be strong opposition to
submit-only extensions because they will destabalize the MTA
infrastructure as a side effect.  Any attempt to deploy a new submit
protocol will fail due to simple economics: no client vendor in their
right mind would spend the time adding a new rarely-available submit
protocol when submit on port 25 is good enough and available everywhere.

If we fail to reach concensus on the current submit proposal or something
closely resembling it (with no new features), we fall back to (b).  The
apparent lack of concensus in the wake of your posts has made (b) the
likely outcome.  Is that really what you want? 

It's never too late to change your mind -- especially since I believe (a)
is much more compatible with your desired goal than (b).

		- Chris

"Good security is hard.  X.509 is harder."