From: Erland Sommarskog (sommar-usefor@algonet.se)
Date: Sat Mar 02 2002 - 14:51:45 CST
Martin Djernaes <djernaes@cisco.com> writes:
> In section 5.4 of the draft you write about the subject field, and how to
> modify this one when replying to a mail. I read that you want to "forbid"
> non "latin" versions of the prefix "Re: ".
>
> Could you please explaing the reason for this? I didn't find (enough)
> information about this in the archive.
Because this is not a pretty sight:
Re: SV: Re: Odp: SV: Some subject line
Not only is it ugly, but if you have configured your newsreader to
start a new thread when subject changes, you get a mess. (This is a
necessity in groups where a root message could lead to threads
several months long, and where the various subthreads may be completely
disjunct from each other.)
Permitting more values for "Re: " would require the various software
out there to understand all those strings. In theory all strings one
to four letters long followed by colon could be interpreted as a reply
marker, But then what about a subject line like:
Subject: NEW: Brian Hitch's "Long Live the Prince"
The other alternative would be to abolish "Re:" completely, but it
is in common practice, and people expect to se it. Changing that
would be to fix something which is not broken.
-- Erland Sommarskog, Stockholm, sommar@algonet.se