Subject: RE: A new SMTP "3821" [Re: FTC stuff...........]

From: "Thomas Gal" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 08:43:23 -0800

Again.....it's incredibly short sited to think that email will be a forever
pervasive medium. While we need stopgap measures, trying to redesign SMTP is
a waste of time. I think we're all much better off putting our efforts into
making sure next generation messaging technologies don't have the same
flaws, than bothering a lick with changing SMTP. Perhaps helping to prod
everyone into using all the standards that are out there already for mail
transport and handling, and implementing them properly is a good idea. The
next generation is already on it's way......

-Tom

[email-masked]  

> -----Original Message-----
> From: [email-masked] 
> [mailto:[email-masked]] On Behalf Of 
> william(at)elan.net
> Sent: Thursday, November 25, 2004 4:18 PM
> To: Alan DeKok
> Cc: MXCOMP
> Subject: Re: A new SMTP "3821" [Re: FTC stuff...........] 
> 
> 
> 
> On Thu, 25 Nov 2004, Alan DeKok wrote:
> 
> >   It's not 1984.  20 years have gone by.  SMTP won those 
> wars and all 
> > of the protocol wars which followed.  No one is arguing 
> that we should 
> > replace SMTP with X.400, or any other non-SMTP scheme.  I'm 
> not one of 
> > the X.400 people.
> 
> I've argued and will be happy to argue again that SMTP needs 
> to be replaced with new protocol entirely instead of putting 
> more and more band-aids on 20 year old protocol that was 
> designed for "simple" mail transactions.
> 
> But creating new mail protocol to replace SMTP would take 
> long time (both in terms of IETF process to create this new 
> protocol and process for it to achieve wide-spread adaption) 
> and spam is a serious problem in our current and immediate 
> situation of using email so we have to do something with what 
> we have (i.e. SMTP) to get this under control and only after 
> that can we take a look at entire thing and see if we can 
> come up with something better taking into the account all the 
> lessons with have learned with what works and what does not in SMTP.
> 
> --
> William Leibzon
> Elan Networks
> [email-masked]
>

---

From: "Hector Santos" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 20:27:21 -0500

----- Original Message -----
From: "Thomas Gal" <[email-masked]>
To: "'william(at)elan.net'" <[email-masked]>; "'Alan DeKok'"
<[email-masked]>
Cc: "'MXCOMP'" <[email-masked]>
Sent: Friday, November 26, 2004 11:43 AM
Subject: RE: A new SMTP "3821" [Re: FTC stuff...........]

> next generation is already on it's way......

That's all fine and dandy.  The last revamping in the industry came from one
where there was a multiple market of formats and transport systems. No real
standard. The "new" internet offered a common ground and thus it became very
prudent for market vendors to being the migration towards the new common
standard.

However, I don't see the "NG" going to have to same effect today, not as a
answer to the spam problem.  The industry cost would be too vast to have a
revamp to a NG.   While NG is on its way and many already feel they already
have a NG system, such as our own, specifically our issue is the external
interface into the system,  the INTERNET gating into our backend framework.
So in my opinion, it is unrealistic to believe a NG is going to be our
"solution."   You will still need to deal with the outside world.

But this is besides the point.  No one, atleast not me, nor anyone else I
believe, is suggesting a complete change to the SMTP system.  What I am
suggesting to look at the protocol to see what is wrong and what can be done
TODAY to fix the key issues with it.   People who have analyzed it
thoroughly along with analyzing the proposal add-ons, can gain from having a
common new ESMTP or expected mode of operations.

IMO, MARID failed because of this lack of analysis.   This lack of analysis
has provided a no-win situation for many of the proposals which all come
back to the same thing - how is SMTP used.  Besides the IP issues with it,
one required it to work this way, the other required it to work that way.
One doesn't require a change at all while another requires a drastic
compliancy change, etc, etc.

What are the common issues here?   I know some answers to that.  Do you
(speaking in general)?       These needs to be debated widely and IMO, I
believe strongly that the proposals will benefit from having a common
expectation of how SMTP will work, and then some.

Sincerely,

Hector Santos, CTO
Santronics Software, Inc.
http://www.santronics.com
305-431-2846 Cell
305-248-3204 Office