Subject: I-D ACTION:draft-gellens-pop3ext-01.txt

From: [email-masked]
Date: Thu, 26 Feb 1998 09:30:28 -0500

A New Internet-Draft is available from the on-line Internet-Drafts directories.

	Title		: POP3 Extension Mechanism
	Author(s)	: L. Lundblade, C. Newman, R. Gellens
	Filename	: draft-gellens-pop3ext-01.txt
	Pages		: 14
	Date		: 25-Feb-98
	
    Post Office Protocol version 3 [POP3] is very widely used. However,
    while it includes some optional commands (and some useful protocol
    extensions have been published), it lacks a mechanism for
    advertising support for these extensions or for behavior
    variations.
 
    Currently these optional features and extensions can only be
    detected by probing, if at all.  This is at best inefficient, and
    possibly worse. As a result, some clients have manual configuration
    options for POP3 server capabilities.
 
    Because one of the most important features of POP3 is its
    simplicity, it is not desirable to have a lot of extensions.
    However, some extensions are necessary (such as ones that provide
    improved security [POP-AUTH]), some are very desirable in certain
    situations, and a means for discovering server behavior is needed.
 
    This memo defines a mechanism to announce support for optional
    commands, extensions, and unconditional server behavior.  Included
    is an initial set of currently implemented capabilities which vary
    between server implementations.  This document also extends POP3
    error messages so that machine parsable codes can be provided to
    the client.  An initial set of response codes is included.

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