authorplaceholder@gorgo.UUCP.UUCP (03/22/87)
Yup. X.400 is here to stay. There are several very nice features to this superset protocol (and no I didn't write the requirement spec.). It is called MTA (Mail Transport Agent) and is used by several mailers. It is quite comprehensive including support for binary format messages and attachments. I get sick of the various GARGANTUA mail headers that come down the wire but what is really needed are better user agent programs, not RFC822. It is not sufficient beyond ASCII text messages and most of the planet doesn't grok alphabetic. Steve Blasingame (Oklahoma City) bsteve@gorgo.att.com ihnp4!occrsh!gorgo!bsteve
fair@ucbarpa.Berkeley.EDU.UUCP (03/24/87)
Steve Blasingame of AT&T asserts that the CCITT X.400 mail standard is here to stay. While this is likely the case (as much as some people might otherwise wish that it would go away), it is not the standard used by the UUCP network, the BITNET, the MAILNET, the USENET or the ARPA Internet. If AT&T wishes to continue to communicate with any of the networks that I just listed, the relevant standard for mail header format is RFC822, not X.400. For those sites that *insist* upon running X.400 mailers, I strongly suggest that you obtain RFC987, which lists mappings between X.400 and RFC822, and implement the recommendations therein. To fail to do so will be to fail to communicate. holding out the forlorn hope that someone in AT&T is listening, Erik E. Fair ucbvax!fair fair@ucbarpa.berkeley.edu