Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!lll-lcc!well!hoptoad!gnu
From: gnu@hoptoad.uucp (John Gilmore)
Newsgroups: comp.mail.headers
Subject: Incredible headers in AT&T "X.400" mail gateway
Message-ID: <1907@hoptoad.uucp>
Date: Thu, 19-Mar-87 04:47:47 EST
Article-I.D.: hoptoad.1907
Posted: Thu Mar 19 04:47:47 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 21-Mar-87 02:41:14 EST
Organization: Nebula Consultants in San Francisco
Lines: 55

I got a message recently from someone in AT&T and it arrived as:


From: ihnp4!ihlpa!sft
Received: by ihnp4.ATT.COM id AA16275; 12 Mar 87 08:07:23 CST (Thu)
Message-Version: 2
>To: /addr=ihnp4!hoptoad!gnu
Date: Thu, 12 Mar 1987 08:06 CST
Message-Service: Mail
Message-Protocol: EMail
End-Of-Header: 
Email-Version: 2
X-Postmark: scott.thompson attbl ih5c422 55669 3129792594 ihlpa!sft
To: hoptoad!gnu
Subject: Re: Wanted: agef program
Ua-Message-Id: <post.sft.Thu, 12 Mar 1987 08:03 CST>
End-Of-Protocol: 

	Thank you for the reply, but I already received a copy.

		THANKS :-)


(And you thought sendmail was bad!  :-)
I was so boggled that I forwarded a copy to Mark Horton, asking
where this bogosity came from and whether it could be stopped.
He said:

> You guessed it, it's an X.400 work-alike.  AT&T actually has a documented
> mail standard that includes all this stuff.  I think they are ugly too,
> but I know it can't be stopped.  I suggest you use the "ignore" command
> in your .mailrc file.

Of course, virtually every bit of the trash in there can be filtered
out, since every message coming through will have the same values.  I
also presume that when ordinary uucp mail finds its way into the X.400
system, these verbose values are supplied by default.  Therefore I
propose that values which are set to the default NOT be inserted into
outgoing headers.  AT THE GATEWAY, not in each recipient in the whole
Internet's .mailrc file!

I also propose that standard header names and syntax be used for
standard header lines, e.g. "To:" rather than ">To:" and "Message-ID:"
rather than "Ua-Message-Id:".  I also find it curious that they
actually followed the RFC822 standard by using "X-" as a prefix on
local header fields -- but only for one of the nine nonstandard headers
they added.

I hope the general run of the mill X.400 gateway-of-the-future does a
lot better than this!
-- 
(C) Copyr 1987	John Gilmore -- no restricted redistribution permitted.
{sun,ptsfa,lll-crg,ihnp4}!hoptoad!gnu		gnu@ingres.berkeley.edu
Love your country but never trust its government.
	       -- from a hand-painted road sign in central Pennsylvania