ietf-mta-filters
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Re: MTA Filters BOF request, LA IETF; Proposed Charter

1998-01-13 10:45:04
From: Harald Tveit Alvestrand <Harald(_dot_)Alvestrand(_at_)maxware(_dot_)no>

2) I will balk VERY strongly at having the letters MTA anywhere near
   the mailing list name (sorry!), the WG name or the charter text.

I think describing filtering taking place between the MTA and the message
store, or in the message store, as UA filtering is wrong, but taking MTA
out of the mailing list/WG names/charter text is fine with me.

   The reason is that I believe the requirements for filtering at the UA
   and filtering in the message path to be VERY different; the UA must
   make a file/reply/drop/mark/call-attention decision; the MTA must
   make a relay/bounce/black-hole decision.

I see no reason a language can't do both of those.  The distinctions
between forward and reply, or reply and bounce, or between drop and black
hole, seem arbitrary.

It's been done on CMU's legacy system; the Sieve draft has mostly reached
concensus that the set of actions in Sieve are reasonable.  I think others
have filtering systems that do both sets of things, and they work.
(Procmail isn't the only one, but it's probably the example with the most
noteriety.)

   I suggest calling it Mailbox Server Filtering Language - MSFL?

I named the language in the draft Sieve.  I like the name (and am sick of
acronyms) but if the name needs to be changed, so be it.

-- 
                                           Tim Showalter 
tjs(_at_)andrew(_dot_)cmu(_dot_)edu


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