In <01KQSMDJEP9A009OMN(_at_)mauve(_dot_)mrochek(_dot_)com>
ned+ietf-822(_at_)mrochek(_dot_)com writes:
In <01KQR2TXIGII009OMN(_at_)mauve(_dot_)mrochek(_dot_)com>
ned+ietf-822(_at_)mrochek(_dot_)com writes:
6. MIME is a set of protocols defined for the Email world, as is
explicitly stated in RFC 2045. Officially speaking, there is no such thing
as MIME within Netnews (which accounts for its extremely poor uptake
within Usenet).
Wrong on several counts. First, MIME is a format in addition to being a
protocol. This has serious implications in regards to how tightly you can draw
boundaries around a particular use of MIME in a specific application transport.
Second, while MIME was originally defined and targetted at email, it lost that
focus long ago -- certainly before RFCs 2045-2049 came out. The current MIME
documents try to make it clear what parts are email-specific and what parts are
more generally applicable. And media types are one of things that are more
generally applicable than just to email.
Well that is far from clear from a reading of RFC 204[56] (I grant you
that the converse is not clear either).
However, looking at the precedents established in the case of HTTP, I see
the use of phraseology such as "MIME-like" and "different use of Internet
Media Types than is typically found in Internet mail". More specifically,
I see that the media type text/plain is different in that naked CR and LF
are allowed, and even line endings that are totally different in the event
that multi-byte charsets are used. And, again, in their usage of
multipart/mixed they allow the use of HTTP headers as body part headers,
with no suggestion that headers not of the form "Content-*" might get
discarded en route.
And naturally they warn that precautions are necessary if ever the HTTP
object is to be moved into a pure (Email) MIME environment, which is
exactly the same as I am proposing to do with Netnews.
7. Usefor rectifies this by defining the usage of the MIME protocols
within Netnews.
And that's a perfectly legitimate thing to do. But you cannot break the
definition of existing media type as part of this process. Pick another media
type, for heaven's sake!
And to the extent that netnews is not a world unto itself, you have to take the
effects of the sort of MIME you select on other things into account.
Yes, we are aware of that.
8. Insofar as MIME introduces the use of headers within the bodies of
articles/messages, it is only to be expected that within Netnews the
general conventions regarding Netnews headers should apply to them. Again,
any resulting messiness is to be confined to the gateways.
And that's fine. Just don't reuse an existing media type in the process.
OK, so you have no problem with
Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="?-?-?-?"
where "?-?-?-?" is a placeholder for some filename in Hungarian, Arabic or
Chinese. Just so long as that usage is confined to Netnews, and is not
seen in Email except in the corresponding RFC 2231 form?
And, naturally, that usage will be seem in the body part headers of a
multipart/mixed (again within Netnews, not Email)? For that is precisely
where you would expect "attachments" to be found.
So I am allowed to reuse the existing media type multipart/mixed.
But not message/rfc822?
9. In fact, there are only two places where MIME in Netnews will differ
from MIME in Email. One is in allowing full UTF-8 within quoted-strings
within parameters in the Content-* headers (and probably in comments
within those headers too). The other is in "message/rfc822". Both these
cases therefore require attention by gateways.
It seems you are accepting the first difference, but not the second?
If that is the case, then there are things that could be done with
message/rfc822. One of them is to revert to the type message/news which we
were proposing to obsolete. The problem with that is that current MUAs do
not recognise it (it was never implemented AFAIK). Or we might insist that
the gateway conversions were done _before_ constructing the message/rfc822
object, but that is hardly necessary within the pure Netnews environment
(not that we expect encapsulated news articles in message/anything to be
at all common - currently they are virtually unknown - but part of the
intent in all of this is to encourage more sensible usages of MIME within
Netnews).
So, yes, this is an issue that maybe I take back to the Usefor WG, but I
would need a little more convincing and understanding of your position
first.
--
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
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