From: Erland Sommarskog (sommar@algonet.se)
Date: Mon Apr 16 2001 - 07:45:46 CDT
John Stanley <stanley@peak.org> writes:
> Wait a minute. If you argue that the header I used as an example cannot be
> local because this draft did not list it as local, how can you then say
> that this draft does not claim to list the local headers? And if the only
> local header is xref, why bother having a definition of local header at
> all?
It is to not clear to me that a header is local just because a site makes
it up at whim. You may be perfectly right that the header is indeed local
in according to the definition in our draft, in which your point is valid.
If nothing else, no matter whether site C likes this scoring system or not,
how could it be able to remove the header, if it does not know that it is
defined as local?
The closest to an answer I get is is section 4.2.2:
When a header is defined, in this (or any future) standard, as having
one (or possibly more) of these properties, it is subject to special
treatment, as indicated below.
This implies that this locally-defined header is not a Local Header,
unless they produce an RFC which defines it as such.
But I admit that this is not completely conclusive.
> I wasn't talking about Site C as a relay. I was talking about the part
> where this draft says that local headers MUST be removed. Not "MAY" be
> removed.
Indeed here is a inconsistency between 4.2.2.2 and 8.4. 4.2.2.2 imposes
an obligation on serving agents on which the section "Duties of a Serving
Agent" is silent.
> >Charles's argument is apparently that this phone number etc at the end is
> >not a signature but vanilla body text.
>
> No, I asked if typing my name was a signature as defined by this draft and
> he said it was. Apparently his argument is that there is some
> interoperability issue raised by my typing my name, since I MUST have a
> dash dash space CRLF in front of it or I am violating this draft.
I have to admit that slept over Charles's response, but of course it doesn't
make sense to claim that any text at the bottom of an article is a signature
and then require it to be delimited in some way.
> > The draft only says MAY ...
>
> Which is a violation of the concept that what you don't understand you
> should not touch. If it isn't a 'back-reference', then it isn't a back
> reference, and according to the syntax, it can be anything at all.
While in violation of the standards, it is intended as a back-reference.
> >Maybe it may all seem theoretical to you, but learn some Swedish
> >and hang around in the Swedish newsgroups for a taste of the real world.
>
> I'm sure glad to find out that Sweden thinks it has a monopoly on "the
> real world". If you have a problem with "Sv: " not being an official
> back-reference, take it up with someone who cares. I'm commention only on
> the stripping out of unknown text at whim.
You are talking about the theoretical case where "SV: " may open a
subject line for some other reason, and it may of course once in a
blue moon. However, in some the of the newsgroups I hang around "SV: "
and "SV: SV: SV: SV: " etc clearly are due to misbehaving software,
and if I wrote a followup agent I could well consider a system to
have it removed. I you don't like that scheme, fine, just don't use
my followup agent.
-- Erland Sommarskog, Stockholm, sommar@algonet.se