Internet-Draft Phil Macias RFC: NOAA/GFDL Updates: 1505, 561, 533, 2111 6 June 2002 Category: Standards track A Mail Header for Sequential Message Numbering draft-macias-seq-numbering-00.txt Status of this Memo This document is an Internet-Draft and is subject to all provisions of Section 10 of RFC2026. Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), its areas, and its working groups. Note that other groups may also distribute working documents as Internet-Drafts. 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." The list of current Internet-Drafts can be accessed at http://www.ietf.org/1id-abstracts.html The list of Internet-Draft Shadow Directories can be accessed at http://www.ietf.org/shadow.html This document specifies an Internet standards track protocol for the Internet community, and requests discussion and suggestions for improvements. Please refer to the current edition of the "Internet Official Protocol Standards" (STD 1) for the standardization state and status of this protocol. Distribution of this memo is unlimited. Copyright Notice Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2002). All Rights Reserved. Abstract This memo describes a proposed mail header to allow tracking of message numbers for mail generated by listservs. Inclusion of the message number in the Subject: field confounds threading in archiving software. Introduction Listservs such as majordomo allow multiple users to follow and respond to multiple subject threads. Mail client software allows individuals to further organize list mail based on selection rules such as author and subject heading. It is common that an individual will have split up the messages from a particular list into several mail folders making it difficult to find a particular list message. Searching is further hindered by continued use of the "Reply" function of the mail client; many list messages have the same Subject:. If the listserv attaches a sequential message number to each list message it is possible to find a particular mail message knowing the list name and sequential message number. Message-IDs are in themselves too long to be of practical use to users in tracking messages. Message archiving software sort mail into threads based on either the Subject: or Message-ID:. Attaching the sequential message number to the Subject: field confounds threading based on Subject:. The proposed header would be called "Message-number". Macias Standards track [Page 1] Internet-Draft Sequential Message Numbering 6 June 2002 Format of the Message-number The format of the Message-number is: Message-number: := positive sequential integer Normative References Walden, David, "MESSAGE-ID NUMBER", RFC 533, July 1973 Levinson, E., "Content-ID and Message-ID Uniform Resource Locator", RFC 2111, March 1997 Security Considerations This RFC describes the Security Considerations sections of an RFC. Authors' Addresses Phil Macias 307 Trinity Court #9 Princeton, NJ, 08540 609 203 5874 (cell) pmacias@gfdl.noaa.gov Full Copyright Statement Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2002). All Rights Reserved. This document and translations of it may be copied and furnished to others, and derivative works that comment on or otherwise explain it or assist in its implementation may be prepared, copied, published and distributed, in whole or in part, without restriction of any kind, provided that the above copyright notice and this paragraph are included on all such copies and derivative works. However, this document itself may not be modified in any way, such as by removing the copyright notice or references to the Internet Society or other Internet organizations, except as needed for the purpose of developing Internet standards in which case the procedures for copyrights defined in the Internet Standards process must be followed, or as required to translate it into languages other than English. The limited permissions granted above are perpetual and will not be revoked by the Internet Society or its successors or assigns. This document and the information contained herein is provided on an "AS IS" basis and THE INTERNET SOCIETY AND THE INTERNET ENGINEERING TASK FORCE DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE INFORMATION HEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE." Macias Standards track [Page 2]