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Re: [Nmh-workers] quotes in personal names

2003-12-14 08:30:05
    Date:        Sun, 14 Dec 2003 12:27:19 +0000
    From:        Ralph Corderoy <ralph(_at_)inputplus(_dot_)co(_dot_)uk>
    Message-ID:  
<200312141227(_dot_)hBECRJj03958(_at_)blake(_dot_)inputplus(_dot_)co(_dot_)uk>

  | Are the double quotes considered special by any relevant RFC?

Yes, they quote strings.

  | If they are then does any processing need to happen to the double quoted
  | string if the double quotes are removed?

No (well \X should turn back into X, for any X, including \ and ").
Those are rare.

But not all strings are 822 (2822) legal without the quotes (the obvious
examples are strings containing , ; :, or most annoyingly . in 2822 - in
822 the rules were much more restrictive (though some .'s were ok), and
most people still observe the 822 rules here).

That is, you cannot have "Dr. Fred Smith" or "Alan Jones Jr." without
the quotes.

For display (in scan, and other places) this is irrelevant of course,
there's no problem scan showing the author as being "A, B, and C"
without the quotes.

  | If not, then I'd rather friendly() left them there as they are
  | characters the user has, maybe indirectly, decided to put there.

They're almost always added by the mailer - usually by lazy mailers, that
can't be bothered checking whether they're necessary or not, so simply add
them always.  They are (2)822 syntax, and aren't intended to be treated as
part of the display name.   friendly() can entirely reasonably remove them.

Also note it is legal (if rarely seen in practice) to have multiple
quoted strings in the display name, as in
         "Nobody" "Special" <nobody(_at_)special(_dot_)com>
so if someone fixes friendly(), handle this as well.

kre



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