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[ietf-dkim] canonicalized null body and dkim

2006-12-14 17:23:18
Mike Thomas and I have been having a conversation about how empty
message bodies should be canonicalized.

Go and reread section 3.4.3. There is text in there that was added to
handle the case of a message body that has been transmitted using
CHUNKING and doesn't have a CRLF at the end of its last line. It
specifies that a missing CRLF must be added to the last line before
passing it to the canonicalizer.

Prior to adding this text, I think that an empty message body would be
canonicalized into an empty input into the canonicalizer. However, a
careful reading of the text in section 3.4.3 indicates that it *would*
have the side affect of adding a CRLF to an empty body as well.

Personally, I think this is an incorrect side affect, and an empty body
should have an empty canonicalization. Several implementations already
canonicalize an empty body into an empty string.

I know we've hit and passed LC, but I think this issue needs a
clarification, one way or another way, before we go to RFC status.

I'd like to see either one of these two statements added to the end of
section 3.4.3:

   a)   As a limiting case, an empty message body would be canonicalized
into a single CRLF pair.

   b)   An empty message body should be canonicalized into an empty string.

        Tony Hansen
        tony(_at_)att(_dot_)com
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