Re: #1029: USEFOR 3.2.2 References: Should comments be a MUST NOT? (fwd)

[Bruce Lilly <blilly@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Wed June 29 2005 07:24, Harald Tveit Alvestrand wrote:
> 
> If nobody wants to say anything about this, I'm going to close it with a 
> "no change needed". I can't accept a change based on a single voice and no 
> raised objection.
> 
>                       Harald
> 
> ---------- Forwarded Message ----------
> Date: onsdag, juni 08, 2005 13:32:05 +0200
> From: Harald Tveit Alvestrand <harald@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> To: ietf-usefor@xxxxxxx
> Cc:
> Subject: #1029: USEFOR 3.2.2 References: Should comments be a MUST NOT?
> 
> 
> New ticket:
> 
> At the moment, section 3.2.2 of usefor-04 says:
> 
>  o Comments in CFWS between message identifiers can cause
>  interoperability problems, so comments SHOULD NOT be generated,
>  but MUST be accepted.

If in fact there are "interoperability problems", they should be described,
and if there is a problem meeting BCP 14 criteria, then MUST NOT would be
indicated.  However, the only issue appears to be that some UAs (no other
software has need to parse a References field) are not compliant with the
specifications (RFC 822, as referenced by RFCs 850 and 1036, has always
permitted comments), and that isn't an interoperability problem of the
sort described in BCP 14.

s/cause interoperability problems/be misinterpreted by non-conforming parsers/
would be more accurate, avoiding the apparent conflict with BCP 14 w.r.t.
serious interoperability issues. 

>  --On 3. juni 2005 01:45 -0400 "Forrest J. Cavalier III"
[...]
>  While we cannot change RFC 2822, it may be logical to change SHOULD
> NOT to MUST NOT.