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rfc:rfc469

NWG/RFC#469 Michael D. Kudlick MDK (SRI-ARC) NIC 14798 8-MAR-73

                    Network Mail Meeting Summary

Introduction

 The purpose of this RFC is to briefly summarize, from the NIC's
 viewpoint, the principal conclusions reached at the Network Mail
 Meeting held Friday, February 23 1973, at SRI-ARC.
    Please refer to RFC #475 (NIC 14919) for Abhay Bhushan's
    comprehensive summary of the issues discussed at the meeting.
    There is no major disagreement between the present RFC and RFC
    #475.
    RFC #453 (NIC 14317) contains background information on the
    meeting.
    RFC #479 (NIC 14948) describes what the NIC would like to see
    included in the File Transfer Protocol for Network Mail purposes,
    and also describes briefly how the NIC would use the information.
 The present RFC is organized as follows:
    Conclusions
    Discussion
    Attendees

Conclusions

 Additional FTP mail requirements were decided upon.  These would be
 implemented as a new mail command, with the following subcommands:
    TO
       This field is explicitly allowed to contain multiple
       addressees, with a standard syntax:  user@host.
    FROM
       This field provides a return-address for notification of
       undeliverable mail, as well as a clearcut identification of the
       sender for the recipient's information..
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NIC 14798 MDK 8-MAR-73 17:24 14798

    AUTHOR
       This field denotes the author of the mail.  There may be
       multiple authors
    TITLE
       The "title" (i.e. subject) of the mail is to be terminated by
       period carriage return.
    ACKNOWLEDEGMENT  success / failure (time out) / normal
       For use by the intermediate host, probably the NIC in most
       cases, to tell the sender what happened to his attempt to send
       mail.  (Note:  "normal" wasn't defined.)
    RECORDED  jnumber / null
       Note: "jnumber" is the pre-assigned accession number (NIC
       number), to be used when known.
       The "RECORDED" subcommand provides for the option of having the
       mail recorded.  Information given with this subcommand would be
       recognized at the NIC. Options are:
          to be recorded (in NIC journal) only,
          to be recorded and distributed,
          to be distributed only.
       This field would also be used to inform the recipient that the
       mail has been recorded.
          (In retrospect, it may be preferable to have a separate
          command to inform the recipient of this fact, but no
          decision on this was made at the 23-Feb-73 meeting.)
    TYPE  long / urgent / ordinary
       This allows the recipient site to take whatever action it
       thinks appropriate in storing the mail.
    TEXT / FILE / CITATION
       TEXT
          This field is for the text of the mail message.
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NIC 14798 MDK 8-MAR-73 17:24 14798

    FILE
       The purpose of the field is unclear to me.  Does it contain a
       machine readable pointer to the file that the sender wishes the
       recipient to read?
    CITATION
       This field is a person-readable pointer to the file that the
       sender wishes the recipient to read.  When the citation command
       is used, no mail is sent other than the citation.

Discussion

 Introduction
    The key aspects in the solution are:
       1) It is based on FTP.
       2) It uses the NIC without requiring direct use of NLS.
       3) There is a mechanism for uniformity in the use of
       user identifications.
       4) There is a mechanism for recording the mail for
       later reference.
    These issues are covered in the discussion that follows.

New FTP Mail Subcommands

 TO
    Addressee Format
       The standard form of the address is:  user@host
       "User" may be an individual's last name; or it may be whatever
       other identification the recipient has chosen AND has made
       known to the rest of the network.
          If the intended host doesn't recognize the intended
          recipient's identification, then it sends back an
          "undeliverable" mail message to the sender's host.  It is up
          to the individual to keep the NIC informed of his wherabouts
          [sic]; otherwise, he may not get his mail on time.
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NIC 14798 MDK 8-MAR-73 17:24 14798

    NIC Role
       The NIC need have no role at all for mail sent from point A to
       point B, whenever that mail is not to be recorded at the NIC.
       For mail that is to be recorded at the NIC, the RECORDED
       subcommand is to be used.
       Also, when the sender does not know the standard address of the
       recipients, he may use the NIC to obtain this information.
    Idents and Addresses
       The NIC will modify its identification files to include the
       "user@host" standard address for each individual.
          Sites may ask the NIC to translate from NIC Ident, or from a
          user's last name, to the standard address.  A query facility
          will be made available at the NIC to do the translation on
          request.  The translation service will also be available for
          "group idents".
          This service would be FTP-like, in term of the prootocol
          [sic] it accepts, but would not be within FTP itself.  A
          different server process would handle Ident translation
          requests.
          Translation will also be done at the NIC when the NIC is
          used as an intermediate point on the delivery route.
             The NIC could be an intermediate point for recording the
             mail as a NIC journal item, and for forwarding the mail
             to its ultimate destinations.  During this process, the
             NIC would translate from NIC idents to standard
             addresses.
    In the NIC ident files, provision already exists to specify
    hardcopy or on-line delivery of recorded (NIC Journal) mail.
          This provision will be extended to include a "network"
          attribute, which means "deliver the mail to the host of this
          person".
          The network attribute may be qualified by restricting all
          mail to be kept at the sender, with only a notification
          message actually mailed.
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NIC 14798 MDK 8-MAR-73 17:24 14798

          Notification would be in the form of a citation giving "to",
          "from", "title", "date of submission", and "location of
          mail".
    TIP Users
       To enable TIP users to have access to the mail system, both for
       sending and receiving mail, it was suggested that some hosts
       will have to be the "home" site for these users (but no more
       than one "home" site per user).
       That is, an account that allows a TIP user to send and receive
       mail will have to be established at such a host.
          For the present, any TIP user can use the SRI-ARC system for
          his mail requirements.
       An alternate solution, that TIP's be equipped with a hardcopy
       device that is continuously available for printing mail, was
       discarded in favor of the above approach.
 FROM
    The "FROM" command in FTP, identifies the sender in "standard
    address" form.
       This will allow "undeliverable" mail notices to be sent back to
       the originator.
          The default condition is that the sender's host must retain
          the mail until it is "delivered" to the recipient's host.
             "Delivered"  means that the recipient's host has accepted
             the mail. It does NOT mean that the recipient has READ
             the mail.
          Alternatively, the sender may designate that an intermediate
          host store the mail.  Then the intermediate host has the
          responsibility of storing the mail until it is "delivered"
          to all intended recipients.
       The "ACKNOWLEDGEMENT" command will allow an optional, positive
       acknowledgement to be given to the originator of the mail (the
       "FROM" addressee), stating that the mail was delivered.
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NIC 14798 MDK 8-MAR-73 17:24 14798

 AUTHOR
    The AUTHOR may be several persons. For recorded documents the
    authors appear separately in the index of authors, to facilitate
    searching for mail when an author is known, but the title and
    location of the mail are unknown.
 TITLE
    The TITLE field is especially useful for recorded mail, since
    indexes on key words in the title can be produced relatively
    easily, and facilitate searching for mail.
    For this reason, the title should be a succinct indicator of the
    contents.
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
    Acknowledgement of failure to deliver should be given to the
    sender.
       An optional, positive acknowledgement of successful delivery to
       the recipient's sitename will be given on request of sender
       (like U.S. CERTIFIED mail).
       No acknowledgement that the recipient actually saw the mail
       will be given (comparable to not having U.S. REGISTERED mail).
 RECORDED
    The concept of "recorded" mail is that a permanent record of the
    mail is kept centrally, to allow future references and re-readings
    of the mail to be made.
       For example, in the NIC Journal system, a record is kept of all
       the items entered into the Journal.  From this record, author,
       title-word, and NIC number indexes are produced to allow for
       references and re-readings.
       The key to retrieval of recorded Journal items is the use of an
       accession number (the NIC number).  This essentially removes
       the possibility of duplicate filenames being used.
    The basic aspect of recorded mail which was discussed at the mail
    meeting is the assignment of an "accession" number.
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NIC 14798 MDK 8-MAR-73 17:24 14798

       It was decided to get the accession numbers from the NIC on an
       as-needed basis, without pre-assignment and without local
       assignment of numbers.
       This subject may be reviewed in the future.  Local assignment
       may be desirable to prevent the NIC from becoming a bottleneck
       in the mail process.
       It was pointed out that local assignment of numbers would be
       un-ambiguous if the numbers included some information such as
       sitename, date, and time.
    One other problem exits [sic], namely "where is the recorded
    document?".
       Initially the document should be in the NIC, but ultimately it
       could be anywhere on the Network, provided only that there is a
       central mechanism for indexing and cataloging all the recorded
       documents.
       The pathname to the recorded document would then include
       filename and sitename.
 TYPE
    The TYPE subcommand was a result of a discussion on the
    problems of large mail files, and the associated
    question of who would pay for the processing and storing
    of these files.
    The main decisions made were:
       a) The processing, transmittal, and storage costs of
       sending mail should be borne at the sender's host.
       b) The processing and storage costs of receiving
       mail should be borne at the recipient's host
       initially, as a default.
    Information to enable the recipient host to make an
    intelligent decision about where to store the incoming
    mail are passed along via the TYPE command.
       The recipient host will have the local option of
       providing either of the following services:
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NIC 14798 MDK 8-MAR-73 17:24 14798

          a) free use of system to send mail;
          b) free use of system to receive mail, i.e. login
          not required for delivery over the Network.  (A
          possible alternative is use of a "mail" account,
          or use of the recipient's account, for processing
          and storage of the incoming mail.
 TEXT / FILE / CITATION
    TEXT
       This field is for the text of the mail message.
    FILE
       The purpose of this field is unclear to me.  Does it contain a
       machine readable pointer to the file that the sender wishes the
       recipient to read?
    CITATION
       The citation is a person-readable pointer to the file that the
       sender wishes the recipient to read.
       An alternative to sending entire messages or files over the
       Network is to use the "CITATION" mechanism. With this, the
       sender sends a short message (the citation) saying, in effect,
       "please read file X at site Y".
          This alternative would be especially useful for
          a) mail that is distributed with group idents (to all
          liaisons, for example), and
          b) "long" files (size not defined) that the recipient may
          not be immediately interested in.
          However no method of enforcing use of this alternative was
          discussed.  It will be up to the recipients to devise a
          scheme satisfactory to them.

Other General Discussion

 Bob Kahn placed on the floor the following question (I paraphrase):
    Can't the design of a mail system be made to include alternative
    sources of data and alternative modes of operation, unless
    exclusion of these alternatives can be quantitatively defended?
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NIC 14798 MDK 8-MAR-73 17:24 14798

    Particular aspects of this question are:
    1) What is the desirability and difficulty of admitting different
    data sources into the mail system?
       What are the "boundaries" that divide permitted from prohibited
       data sources?
       What is the quantitative distinction between deferred and
       realtime mail?
       Will the design we come up with allow such things as
          a) handling a calendar that reflects the known and
          anticipated whereabouts of people so that meetings can be
          scheduled sensibly?
          b) formatting the mail contents for later query and other
          information handling?
    2) Whatever primitives we implement, can't they be designed so as
    not to preclude things like Tenex "linking"?
       This requires two-way data communication paths.
       How do we specify and get the attention of a "sink" for the
       data stream?
          e.g., for interprocess communication, and for Tenex-type
          "linking".
 The general reaction to this discussion was one of perspective:
    In the scheme of things that could be considered "point-to-point
    communication", mailbox-type of communication is not the most
    general kind.
    AKB listed several types of communication problems:
       program-program communication
       people-people real-time communication,  e.g.
       Tenex-type "links"
       computer teleconferencing
       mailbox communication: cataloging, storage
       protocols: host-host, telnet, file transfer
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NIC 14798 MDK 8-MAR-73 17:24 14798

    A design for a mailbox-type system won't be required to encompass
    the problems of, say, a computer teleconferencing system, which
    has attributes (real-time, video, very large volume of data to be
    transferred, to name some) that are not attributes of a mail box
    system.

Attendees at the Network Mail Meeting 2/23/73 at SRI-ARC

         Nancy Mimno             BBN
 ACB     Alan Bomberger  AMES-67
 AKB     Abhay Bhushan   MIT-DMOG
 AWH     Wayne Hathaway  AMES-67
 CHI     Charles Irby            SRI-ARC
 DHC     Dave Crocker            UCLA-NMC
 JBP     Jon Postel              UCLA-NMC
 JDH     Dave Hopper             SRI-ARC
 JEW     Jim White               SRI-ARC
 LPD     Peter Deutsch           PARC-MAXC
 MCK     Mark Krilanovich        UCSB-MOD75
 MDK     Mike Kudlick            SRI-ARC
 REK2    Bob Kahn                ARPA
 RKK     Rajendra Kanodia        MIT-MULTICS
 RST     Ray Tomlinson   BBN-TENEX
       [ This RFC was put into machine readable form for entry ]
       [ into the online RFC archives by Joseph Marshall 9/97  ]
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