ietf-822
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Getting RFC 2047 encoding right

2003-12-07 09:42:46

Hi,

I have a tiny little problem that you chaps may be able to help me with.

Suppose that a mail client receives a message whose subject is encoded according to RFC 2047. Suppose further that the message is decoded and stored in a database somewhere - in RAM, on disk, on a server somewhere. Some time later, the same or a different program sends a reply.

Now, to be kind and courteous that program should use the same subject field, perhaps prefaced by "Re: " (or "Auto: "), such that if the recipient threads based on subject, everything work, no matter whether the recipient supports RFC 2047 or not.

That implies using the same character set, q/b encoding etc. as the original.

To be kind and courteous, the program should use a widely supported character set when 2047-encoding (whether it's composing original messages or replies), and use as few 2047-encoded words as possible.

To be kind and courteous, the program should observe all other rules set out in RFC 2047 and 2822 (including ones which were broken by an earlier message).

To be reliable and bug-free, the algorithm that does all this should be simple and straightforward.

There's a conflict here. How do you all address this?

--Arnt

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