Path: utzoo!utgpu!watserv1!watmath!att!linac!pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!usc!apple!bionet!turbo.bio.net!lear
From: lear@turbo.bio.net (Eliot)
Newsgroups: news.software.b
Subject: Re: C News milestone
Message-ID: <Nov.29.11.17.06.1990.11740@turbo.bio.net>
Date: 29 Nov 90 19:17:06 GMT
References: <1990Nov13.215847.23684@zoo.toronto.edu> <=8:6F68@xds13.ferranti.com> <NS|^SD|@rpi.edu> <4_377B@xds13.ferranti.com> <1990Nov27.230750.3478@looking.on.ca>
Organization: GenBank Computing Resource for Mol. Biology
Lines: 38

brad@looking.on.ca (Brad Templeton) writes:

>RFC822 says that message-ids must be  <valid-domain-email-address> which
>is not just <unique@domain> but <validusername@domain>, which means that
>certain characters are out, like colons, commas, etc.

RFC 822 states exactly the following:

     4.6.1.  MESSAGE-ID / RESENT-MESSAGE-ID

             This field contains a unique identifier  (the  local-part
        address  unit)  which  refers to THIS version of THIS message.
        The uniqueness of the message identifier is guaranteed by  the
        host  which  generates  it.  This identifier is intended to be
        machine readable and not necessarily meaningful to humans.   A
        message  identifier pertains to exactly one instantiation of a
        particular message; subsequent revisions to the message should
        each receive new message identifiers.

In addition,

     msg-id      =  "<" addr-spec ">"            ; Unique message id
     addr-spec   =  local-part "@" domain        ; global address
     local-part  =  word *("." word)             ; uninterpreted
                                                 ; case-preserved
     word        =  atom / quoted-string
     quoted-string = <"> *(qtext/quoted-pair) <">; Regular qtext or
                                                 ;   quoted chars.

     qtext       =  <any CHAR excepting <">,     ; => may be folded
                     "\" & CR, and including
                     linear-white-space>

So basically, the only characters that cannot be in the local part of
a message id are "/" and CR.
-- 
Eliot Lear
[lear@turbo.bio.net]