Yamamoto-san,
At 11:15 PM 5/28/2001, Kazu Yamamoto wrote:
Reading RFC2822, I realized that I should modify my mail reader to
combine addresses to a single To: field as you said, Ned.
I needed to know why RFC2822 made such a change before implementing
it.
Forgive me, but the discussion of the reason for a particular choice is
entirely separate from the decision to implement a standard. An
implementor does not pick and choose the parts of a standard that they
like. Either they implement the standard or they do not.
However it is always helpful to understand reasons. I'll offer my own
understanding of the reason for this, specific choice: RFC 822 stated that
the interpretation of multiple address headers, of the same type. Hence
there has never been a 'standard' definition for the meaning of multiple
headers. This sort of flexibility in a standard invites differences in
implementation behavior. And THAT invites non-interoperability.
There is no real benefit in having this bit of flexibility, so it is better
for interoperability to eliminate it. The less choice a programmer has,
the more likely their software will interwork with others.
d/
----------
Dave Crocker <mailto:dcrocker(_at_)brandenburg(_dot_)com>
Brandenburg InternetWorking <http://www.brandenburg.com>
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