From: Charles Lindsey (chl@clw.cs.man.ac.uk)
Date: Wed Mar 27 2002 - 04:07:09 CST
In <oSwrCdC2TJo8IAVr@pillar.turnpike.com> Ian Bell <ianbell@turnpike.com> writes:
>...but I suppose that if language tags aren't being used, and headers
>with parameters are not going to be folded [mid-parameter], just sending
>parameter values with utf-8 is indeed very like sending phrases with
>utf-8.
Indeed. Though I don't see why folding mid-parameter shouile affect the
issue.
Essentially, gateways have the choice to leaving the utf-8 characters (in
phrases and parameters) alone, in the hope that they will at least get
through the mail transport system unscathed (mail readers may then
display/interpret them in strange ways).
Or else they attempt to convert them using RFC 2047 and/or RFC 2231.
There is a good chance that the first alternative will work (or at least
do not harm) so far as the transport is concerned, especially if the
headers in question are encapsulated in a message/rfc822. I believe
sendmail is the only common system that will cause trouble, though I
observe that my own sendmail regularly shows me Subject lines with
non-ascii characters in them. Does anyone now more precisely which headers
sendmail is likley to truncate the 8th bit in (I gather it uses that 8th
bit for some internal bookkeeping)?
Anyway, I have to say something about this when I look again at the
Gatewaying stuff in section 8.
-- Charles H. Lindsey ---------At Home, doing my own thing------------------------ Tel: +44 161 436 6131 Fax: +44 161 436 6133 Web: http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~chl Email: chl@clw.cs.man.ac.uk Snail: 5 Clerewood Ave, CHEADLE, SK8 3JU, U.K. PGP: 2C15F1A9 Fingerprint: 73 6D C2 51 93 A0 01 E7 65 E8 64 7E 14 A4 AB A5