Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/17/84; site plus5.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!ihnp4!plus5!hokey
From: hokey@plus5.UUCP (Hokey)
Newsgroups: net.mail
Subject: Uucp mail headers
Message-ID: <688@plus5.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 15-Apr-85 14:59:04 EST
Article-I.D.: plus5.688
Posted: Mon Apr 15 14:59:04 1985
Date-Received: Tue, 16-Apr-85 01:23:47 EST
Organization: Plus Five Computer Services, St. Louis
Lines: 62
Keywords: uucp project, sendmail, rmail

What should be used in the headers of mail between uucp sites?

As it stands, mail passed along from site to site (without passing through
a site which uses sendmail, or possibly delivermail) will generate this:

	From uucp <date>
	>From uucp <date> remote from site1
	>From uucp <date> remote from site2
	...
	>From user <date> remote from sendersite

where "remote from" can be "forwarded by" under some circumstances.  If site1
is running sendmail, the header will (probably) be:

	From uucp <date>
	>From site2!...!sendersite!user remote from site1
	From: [anybody's guess]
	Received: by site1; <date>	(or something close)
	To: somesite!user

Basically, non-RFC822 mailers stuff most of the information an '822 mailer
puts in the Received: line into the >From line.  The obvious information
is the timestamp.  The timestamp is useful if you want to see how long it
took the message to go from one site to the next.

This information in the >From lines is lost whenever the mail passes through
a sendmail site, because sendmail doesn't recognize >From lines.  It is
possible to write an rmail which will build Received: lines from >From lines.
Does anybody care?

The next point is domain names.  Right now, mail from (and, perhaps, through)
cbosgd looks like "cbosgd!cbosgd.ATT.UUCP!...".  If the message is being sent
to a class 3 mail system from cbosgd, it is not necessary for the initial
"cbosgd!" to be prepended.  There are two ways cbosgd's site name can be
reported:

	From uucp <date> remote from cbosgd
	>From uucp <date> remote from cbosgd.ATT.UUCP
or
	From uucp <date> remote from cbosgd!cbosgd.ATT.UUCP

The second form works fine on the couple of mail user interfaces I have seen.
Does anybody know of a mail program which does not like the second form?

Why is there a distinction between class 1 and class 2 sites?  Class 1 sites
are assumed to be "traditional" mail sites.  The only difference (that I
know of) between class 1 and class 2 is that class 2 sites will accept mail
in which the next machine in the route/address is the current machine; i.e.,
from upstream, the following is executed:

	uux site!rmail  site!blah	(where blah is a user or a route)

That's it for now.  Other remaining issues include the format of information
on Sender and Recipient lines, >From and From: with respect to replies,
mail to Postmaster, better integration of the mail system with netnews,
and some pie-in-the-sky issues about passing messages between neighbors.

Oh, and I almost forgot a biggie: gateways, and how addresses should be
converted as they pass from one mail network into another.
-- 
Hokey           ..ihnp4!plus5!hokey
		  314-725-9492