ietf-822
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Re: New Internet Draft: draft-duerst-archived-at-00.txt

2004-02-24 03:02:46

Keith... I made a suggestion that I think addresses your concern as previously expressed, but you don't respond to that. Viz:
[[[[
If you feel there's an implied dependency, maybe something like this could be added to the text:
[[
One way to use this header field is to include an HTTP URI, which can be passed to a web browser to retrieve and display a copy of the archived message. But other URI schemes may be used, such as imap:, and mail applications may use the information thus provided in any way that assists access to archived mail messages.
]]
]]]] -- http://www.imc.org/ietf-822/mail-archive/msg04050.html

If developers don't choose to deploy imap: in the face of such a comment, then I submit that they are never likely to do so at the exhortation of any standard.

I think there's a real danger that your quest for something else will impede the standardization of a Really Useful Feature, for which there is running code. I think I have heard you subscribe to the idea that the best is the enemy of the good in standards development ... I think this could be a shining case in point.

What is it that you want to happen to this proposal?

#g
--

PS: FWIW, I use the feature described on an almost-daily basis, and I find that using a browser to search email archives is not at all perverse. Quite often, I find myself switching between a mail archive and Google to track down information, and the browser is a natural user interface that spans both of these. The feature described here is really very useful and is deployed today (modulo an X- at the front of the header field name).


At 19:38 23/02/04 -0500, Keith Moore wrote:
Is this extension for email readers or for web browsers?

Neither, or both. It's an extension to the message *format*, not the protocol. Applications may use it (or not) as they see fit.

While that might be true in principle, it's not true in practice. A mail reader is much more likely to be able to make effective use of an IMAP URL than an HTTP URL. And it's more likely to do a good job handling a message/rfc822 resource than with a text message encoded as text/html. There's something perverse in asking a mail reader to fire up a web browser to read an email message. And for some strange reason I think that extensions to the email format that exist for the purpose of reading mail should be usable by mail readers.

------------
Graham Klyne
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