Re: 2822upd-04 definition of terms needed

At 12:24 27-01-2008, Bruce Lilly wrote:
>I don't pretend to know whether or not any given person wants to do
>the right thing.  I do know that a significant number of systems
>are doing something quite silly, and I suspect that that silliness

Agreed.

>is due in large measure to ambiguities in 2822 and/or conflicts
>with other relevant specifications, and I further suspect that the
>amount of such silliness will increase in the absence of
>clarification.

I suspect that this is due to people not reading the RFC to do the right thing.

>One example of the sort of suspected conflict, and the reason for the
>request for definitions, is illustrated by the following example of
>silliness:
>
>Party A sends a message (e.g. an error report of some sort) to party
>B.  Because A, a good net citizen, wishes to avoid mail loops, he
>sets the envelope address to a null path in accordance with the
>provisions established for that purpose by RFC 821 and affirmed by
>RFC 1123 (though curiously not permitted by 2821, but that's not
>an issue for the draft under discussion).  A does not want any
>delivery reports or disposition notifications or message tracking
>reports (or any response at all), so consequently does not include
>SMTP commands and/or message fields which would trigger those (RFCs
>3461-3464, 3798, 3888).  A specifically states (in the message body)
>that he does not want any response.  Upon receipt of the message from
>A (with null return path), B, a rather silly system, sends an automatic
>receipt message. Contrary to years of established practice and good
>sense, not to mention a documented strong recommendation against doing
>so in RFC 3834, B sends that automated reply to the mailbox(es) in the
> >From field of A's original message, completely ignoring the null return
>path.  Why does B do such a silly thing?  Because RFC 2822 tells him to
>do so (as does the current draft text, from which the following are
>quoted):

B does it because he/she has not read RFC 3834.

>section 3.6.2, omitting pagination text and whitespace for brevity):
>
>      In the absence of the "Reply-To:" field,
>    replies SHOULD by default be sent to the mailbox(es) specified in the
>    "From:" field unless otherwise specified by the person composing the
>    reply.
>
>and section 3.6.3:
>
>    When a message is a reply to another message, the mailboxes of the
>    authors of the original message (the mailboxes in the "From:" field)
>    or mailboxes specified in the "Reply-To:" field (if it exists) MAY
>    appear in the "To:" field of the reply since these would normally be
>    the primary recipients of the reply.
>
>
>Note that neither text distinguishes between "automatic" (as used in
>RFC 3834) replies vs. manually-initiated replies.  It appears (lacking
>a real definition) that the use of "automatic" and variants in 2822upd-04
>differs markedly from the meaning in RFC 3834; but (lacking a real
>definition of how they are intended to be interpreted in 2822upd-04)
>that's just a hunch.

When we reply to a message, it is usually addressed to the 
author(s).  Automated replies are usually addressed to the sender of 
the message.  There is a distinction between the two.

>What can A do to avoid these annoying automated replies?  Not much
>(at least if he "really wants to do the right thing") according to
>2822upd-04:

"A" cannot do much as he/she depends on B to do the right thing.

Regards,
-sm