ietf-822
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Re: /alternative

1991-11-13 10:11:12
Does this make the rationale clearer here?  The reason I want it to be
mandatory is that the whole point is to facilitate "graceful
degradation" from the world's fanciest mail reader to other
standards-compliant ones.  If it isn't mandatory, I don't think it can
fly at all -- the user will still have to explicitly know whether or not
a recipient uses his high-end mail reader before he feels safe sending
the fanciest forms of mail.  -- Nathaniel

Thanks for the explanation.  If this is mandatory, the unenlightened (but
compliant) UA will see only the second part.  If not mandatory, it may or
may not also see the first part, depending on the implementation.  And 
this will stop people from sending the super-unleaded mail unless they
know what's on the other end.  I'm going to take your word for this, given
your experience with Andrew, and the relative ease of implementation.

The text in 7.2.2 says "User agents should display the FIRST part that they
are capable of displaying", while Appendix A says they "MUST...display only
the first recognized part".  I think a combination of these is correct if
this is mandatory.  I suggest "User agents MUST display ONLY the first 
recognized part they are capable of displaying", or something similar.

Jim

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