Subject: conneg for better mailing list formats

From: Dave Crocker <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 16 Jul 2002 13:07:55 +0900

References to the relationship between multipart/alternative and use of 
Conneg have triggered a possibility that I'd like to explore:

We currently have many mailing lists that permit html content and many that 
do not.  Most of the time, the enforcement of that rule is entirely social, 
ie, non-computer.  There is no protocol support for telling senders what 
content format is preferred or what format(s) are prohibited.

Conneg can fix that.  Conneg permits the recipient system to state and 
enforce content format "permissions".

Even better, this can combine with multipart/alternative very constructively.

The originator sends multipart/alternative content, such as html and 
text/plain.  The sending MTA invokes conneg and sends only the content 
format that the receiving mailing list server is willing to accept.

d/

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Dave Crocker <mailto:[email-masked]>
TribalWise, Inc. <http://www.tribalwise.com>
tel +1.408.246.8253; fax +1.408.850.1850