Internet DRAFT - draft-gellens-acap-acnt
draft-gellens-acap-acnt
Internet Draft R. Gellens
Document: draft-gellens-acap-acnt-00.txt QUALCOMM, Incorporated
Expires: 12 September 1998 12 March 1998
ACAP Email Account Dataset Class
Status of this Memo:
This document is an Internet Draft. Internet Drafts are working
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Discussion and suggestions for improvement are requested.
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1. Abstract
It has become common for Internet mail users to have more than one
account where mail is received, to access multiple accounts from
the same machine, to access the same accounts from different
machines, and to use multiple programs which require account
configuration information.
The Application Configuration Access Protocol [ACAP] provides an
ideal mechanism for storage of email account data.
This specification defines a standard ACAP dataset class for email
accounts, and a common option for indicating a default.
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2. Conventions Used in this Document
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", and "MAY"
in this document are to be interpreted as defined in "Key words for
use in RFCs to Indicate Requirement Levels" [KEYWORDS].
3. ACAP Standard Options
This specification defines the MUA Default Account standard option.
This is a scaler option in the ACAP Standard Option ("/option")
dataset. The entry name is "mua.default.account". The
"option.value" attribute contains the value, which is a URL.
Generally, this will be an ACAP URL pointing to an entry in an
Email Account dataset.
The standard option dataset class is specified in [ACAP-OPTIONS].
ACAP URLs are defined in [ACAP].
4. ACAP Email Account Dataset Class
The ACAP Email Account dataset class defines a set of attributes
which specify an email account; that is, configuration information
used for access to email on a POP or IMAP server.
4.1. ACAP Email Account Dataset Class Prefix
Datasets whose names begin with "/account" are assumed to contain
email account entries as defined in this specification.
4.2. ACAP Email Account Dataset Hierarchy
Each user may have a set of named email accounts. The default is
pointed at by the "mua.default.account" standard option. (See
section 3 for more information.)
Inheritance is likely to be useful both for inheriting site or
group defaults (for example, POP or IMAP servers, and initial
client configuration in general) as well as for inheriting
user-specific configuration when using different machines.
5. Recommended ACAP Email Account Dataset Attributes
An email account entry MUST have an "entry" attribute. All other
attributes are OPTIONAL.
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Attributes are specified using Augmented Backus-Naur Form [ABNF].
All attributes are single-valued and textual unless otherwise
stated.
The BNF defines the content of the attribute values prior to their
encoding as an ACAP string. Clients MUST conform to the syntax
when generating these attributes, but MUST NOT assume that the
attribute values will conform to this syntax on access. Servers
MUST NOT enforce the syntax.
5.1. Basic Attributes
These attributes are defined in ACAP [ACAP] and have meaning in all
dataset classes. The section describes how they are used in an
email account dataset.
entry
The "entry" attribute is used to hold a unique name for the
account. This name is used for inheritance, so when
customizing an account which has an entry in an inherited
dataset, the entry name needs to remain the same. The name
should also be descriptive.
subdataset
The "subdataset" attribute indicates there is another email
account dataset underneath this entry.
5.2. Specific Attributes
These attributes are specific to the Email Account dataset class.
account.check-interval
This specifies the interval, in seconds, between checks (polls)
for new mail.
acnt-check-int = 1*DIGIT
account.connection-type
This contains a token indicating the type of connection used
for this account. Clients might use this information to modify
their use of bandwidth.
acnt-conn = "direct" / "cable-modem" / "phone-modem"
account.leave-on-server.flag
This specifies if the client should delete mail from the server
after downloading. This is generally useful only with [POP3]
servers which support this.
acnt-lmos-flag = "0" / "1"
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account.leave-on-server.days
When account.leave-on-server.flag is set (value is "1"), this
attribute specifies the number of days messages should remain
on the server before being deleted by the client. This is
generally useful only with [POP3] servers which support leaving
mail on the server.
acnt-lmos-days = 1*DIGIT
account.maximum.download-size
This contains the maximum size (in octets) of messages to be
downloaded. This is most useful when accessing messages via
[POP3].
acnt-max-dsize = 1*DIGIT
account.personality
This specifies the default personality to assign to messages
received via this account. It is generally an ACAP URL to an
entry in an Email Personality dataset. The ACAP Email
Personality dataset class is specified in [ACAP-PERSONALITY].
ACAP-URLs are defined in [ACAP].
acnt-personality = url ;defined in [URL-BASIC]
account.server.IMAP
The indicates the default IMAP server to use with this account.
It is generally an IMAP URL, as specified in [URL-IMAP].
acnt-imap = url ;defined in [URL-BASIC]
account.server.POP
This specifies the POP server associated with this account. It
is generally a POP URL, as defined in [URL-POP].
acnt-pop = url ;defined in [URL-BASIC]
account.sieve.script
This specifies the text of a Sieve script which will be applied
by the delivery agent (if supported) to mail arriving at this
account. Sieve is specified in [SIEVE].
acnt-sieve = 1*UTF8-CHAR
account.taboo-headers
This multi-valued attribute is a list of header prefixes. If
the client has a mode where it suppresses display of certain
headers and/or properties of messages, headers which start with
a prefix included in this attribute are candidates for
suppression. Prefix strings should be converted to lower case
to simplify searching.
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acnt-taboo = 1*VCHAR
6. Examples
entry home
account.connection-type phone-modem
account.personality home
account.server.pop POP://jru;AUTH=APOP@pop.isp.com
account.sieve.script IF SIZE OVER 100k
DISCARD;
entry work
account.connection-type direct
account.personality work
account.server.imap IMAP://jru@mail.bigcorp.com
account.sieve.script IF HEADER "FROM" IS "BOSS"
FILEINTO "STUFF"
7. References
[ABNF] Crocker, Overell, "Augmented BNF for Syntax Specifications:
ABNF", RFC 2234, Internet Mail Consortium, Demon Internet Ltd.,
November 1997. <ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc2234.txt>
[ACAP] Newman, Myers, "ACAP -- Application Configuration Access
Protocol", RFC 2244, Innosoft, Netscape, November 1997.
<ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc2244.txt>
[ACAP-OPTIONS] Hole, "ACAP Application Options Dataset Class", The
Esys Corporation, Work in Progress, February 1998.
<ftp://ftp.isi.edu/internet-drafts/draft-ietf-acap-options-xx.txt>
[ACAP-PERSONALITY] Gellens, "ACAP Email Personality Dataset Class",
QUALCOMM, Incorporated, Work in Progress, March 1998.
<ftp://ftp.isi.edu/internet-drafts/draft-gellens-acap-pers-xx.txt>
[KEYWORDS] Bradner, "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", RFC 2119, Harvard University, March 1997.
<ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc2119.txt>
[POP3] Myers, J., Rose, M., "Post Office Protocol -- Version 3",
RFC 1939, Carnegie Mellon, Dover Beach Consulting, Inc., May 1996.
<ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc1939.txt>
[URL-BASIC] Berners-Lee, Masinter, McCahill, "Uniform Resource
Locators (URL)", RFC 1738, CERN, Xerox Corporation, University of
Minnesota, December 1994. <ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc1738.txt>
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[URL-IMAP] Newman, "IMAP URL Scheme", RFC 2192, Innosoft, September
1997. <ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc2192.txt>
[URL-POP] Gellens, "POP URL Scheme", QUALCOMM Incorporated, Work in
Progress, February 1998.
<ftp://ftp.isi.edu/internet-drafts/draft-gellens-pop-url-xx.txt>
[UTF8] Yergeau, F. "UTF-8, a transformation format of ISO 10646",
RFC 2279, Alis Technologies, January 1998.
<ftp://ftp.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc2279.txt>
[SIEVE] Showalter, "Sieve -- a Mail Filtering Language", Carnegie
Mellon, Work in Progress, January 1998.
<ftp://ftp.isi.edu/internet-drafts/draft-showalter-sieve-xx.txt>
8. Security Considerations
As with ACAP datasets in general, it is important that access
controls are set correctly on Email Account datasets. Besides the
server URLs, the Sieve script may contain highly personal
information which should not be disclosed except by explicit owner
request.
9. Author's Address
Randall Gellens +1 619 651 5115
QUALCOMM, Incorporated +1 619 651 5334 (fax)
6455 Lusk Blvd. Randy@Qualcomm.Com
San Diego, CA 92121-2779
U.S.A.
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