Network Working Group R. Sparks Internet-Draft Tekelec Intended status: Informational Mar 26, 2013 Expires: September 27, 2013 IMAP Access to IETF Email List Archives draft-sparks-genarea-imaparch-05 Abstract The IETF makes heavy use of email lists to conduct its work. This often involves accessing the archived history of those email lists. Participants would like to have the ability to browse and search those archives using standard IMAP clients. This memo captures the requirements for providing a service that would allow such browsing and searching. Status of this Memo This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79. Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet- Drafts is at http://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/. Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference material or to cite them other than as "work in progress." This Internet-Draft will expire on September 27, 2013. Copyright Notice Copyright (c) 2013 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the document authors. All rights reserved. This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal Provisions Relating to IETF Documents (http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of publication of this document. Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as Sparks Expires September 27, 2013 [Page 1] Internet-Draft IMAP Access to IETF Email List Archives Mar 2013 described in the Simplified BSD License. Table of Contents 1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 2. Requirements for IMAP access to archived IETF lists . . . . . . 3 3. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 4. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 5. Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 6. Changelog . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 6.1. 04 to 05 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 6.2. 03 to 04 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 6.3. 02 to 03 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 6.4. 01 to 02 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 6.5. 00 to 01 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 6.6. 00 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 7. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Author's Address . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Sparks Expires September 27, 2013 [Page 2] Internet-Draft IMAP Access to IETF Email List Archives Mar 2013 1. Introduction The IETF makes heavy use of email lists to conduct its work. This often involves accessing the archived history of those email lists. Requirements for improved web-based browsing and searching of these archives are captured in [RFC6778]. Participants would like to have the ability to browse and search those archives using standard IMAP clients. This memo captures the requirements for providing a service that would allow such browsing and searching. Discussion of this memo should take place on the ietf@ietf.org mailing list. 2. Requirements for IMAP access to archived IETF lists Many participants would prefer to access the list archives using IMAP [RFC3501]. Providing this access while meeting the following requirements will likely require an IMAP server with specialized capabilities. o The system should expose the archive using an IMAP interface, with each list represented as a mailbox. o This interface must work with standard IMAP clients. o The interface should allow users that have provided credentials to each have their own read/unread marks for messages. Allowing other annotation is desirable. The implementation should consider taking advantage of the IMAP extensions for ANNOTATE [RFC5257] and METADATA [RFC5464]. o The interface must have server-side searching enabled, and should support multiple simultaneous extensive searches. The server should facilitate the enhanced search capabilities described in [RFC6778]. The implementation should consider taking advantage of the extensions defined for IMAP SORT and THREAD [RFC5256], multimailbox search [RFC6237], and fuzzy search [RFC6203]. o When the system requires credentials, it must use the datatracker's authentication system - While the vast majority of archived lists have an open access policy, some archived lists have restricted archives. The system must make it possible to limit access to a restricted archive based on login credentials. Sparks Expires September 27, 2013 [Page 3] Internet-Draft IMAP Access to IETF Email List Archives Mar 2013 - The system must not require credentials for accessing lists with open archives. (But it is acceptable for a user to access such archives while providing credentials). 3. Security Considerations Allowing IMAP as an interface for browsing and searching the archives of IETF email lists does not affect the security of the Internet in any significant fashion. 4. IANA Considerations This document has no actions for IANA. 5. Acknowledgements This text was derived directly from an early version of the Internet Draft that became [RFC6778] which incorporated text suggestions from Alexey Melnikov, Pete Resnick, and S. Moonesamy. Barry Leiba suggested several references to IMAP extensions for an implementation to consider. 6. Changelog 6.1. 04 to 05 o Adapted text from RFC6778 to make it more clear that both authenticated and unauthenticated access should be supported. 6.2. 03 to 04 o Incorporated suggestions from Pete Resnick and Barry Leiba. 6.3. 02 to 03 o None - expiry refresh 6.4. 01 to 02 o Minor editorial changes Sparks Expires September 27, 2013 [Page 4] Internet-Draft IMAP Access to IETF Email List Archives Mar 2013 6.5. 00 to 01 o Added requirements to enable controlled access to restricted archives based on credentials o Generalized the requirement to use the datatracker's credentials. 6.6. 00 o Split this set of requirements out from the mailarch doc so that this project could be pursued separately 7. Informative References [RFC3501] Crispin, M., "INTERNET MESSAGE ACCESS PROTOCOL - VERSION 4rev1", RFC 3501, March 2003. [RFC5256] Crispin, M. and K. Murchison, "Internet Message Access Protocol - SORT and THREAD Extensions", RFC 5256, June 2008. [RFC5257] Daboo, C. and R. Gellens, "Internet Message Access Protocol - ANNOTATE Extension", RFC 5257, June 2008. [RFC5464] Daboo, C., "The IMAP METADATA Extension", RFC 5464, February 2009. [RFC6203] Sirainen, T., "IMAP4 Extension for Fuzzy Search", RFC 6203, March 2011. [RFC6237] Leiba, B. and A. Melnikov, "IMAP4 Multimailbox SEARCH Extension", RFC 6237, May 2011. [RFC6778] Sparks, R., "Requirements for Archiving IETF Email Lists and for Providing Web-Based Browsing and Searching", RFC 6778, October 2012. Sparks Expires September 27, 2013 [Page 5] Internet-Draft IMAP Access to IETF Email List Archives Mar 2013 Author's Address Robert Sparks Tekelec 17210 Campbell Road Suite 250 Dallas, Texas 75254-4203 USA Email: rjsparks@nostrum.com Sparks Expires September 27, 2013 [Page 6]