[Tracker-discuss] [issue158] multi-line From headers in outgoing mail break PINE

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

skip at pobox.com writes:

 >     >> I received a complaint from Dennis Allison that the tracker sends
 >     >> email with multiline From headers, which (he thinks) are disallowed
 >     >> by the RFC and in any case cause problems with his PINE email reader
 > 
 >     Erik> Yes, this has been recorded as issue147 in the meta tracker. In the
 >     Erik> last message of this issue, I asked Dennis to provide an example
 >     Erik> message. I'm still waiting for a reply. 
 > 
 >     Erik> I'm also not convinced the from lines produced by roundup are
 >     Erik> forbidden by RFC.

Folding white space (ie, a CRLF pair followed by a sequence of SPACE
or TAB) is legal in certain places in the From header, including in
the contents of a quoted-string.

For example, both

From: "Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen at xemacs.org>,
      Skip <skip at pobox.com>

and

From: "Jugemu Jugemu Gokonosurikire Kaijarisuigyono Suigyomatsu
       Unraimatsu Kuunerutokoroni Sumutokoro Yaburakoujino Burakouji
       Paipopaipopaipono Shuringan Shuringan'no Gurindai Gurindaino
       Ponpokopino Ponpokonano Choukyuumeino Chousuke"
      <longluckylife at rakugo.or.jp>

are legal from headers according to both RFC 822 (which is still STD
11) and RFC 2822 (the heir apparent).  Neither is in any way abusive.
The ones posted in issue147 were legal as posted (but I'd still LART
the MUA that produced it -- or the MTA that munged it -- a good one!)

 > Though to play nicely in the sandbox Roundup should be strict in what it
 > produces and Pine should be forgiving in what it accepts.
 > 
 > The From_ (as opposed to the From:) header of the message I'm responding to
 > is 96 characters long and was not wrapped.

From_ headers are added by the receiving MTA (per Unix mbox tradition,
AFAIK there is no formal standard for these), so clearly are not the
responsibility of Roundup.

 > Is it possible that Roundup is doing the right thing but that some
 > misbehaving MTA between Roundup and Dennis is doing the line
 > wrapping he sees?

This is quite possible, but it's likely that Roundup (or the Python
email module) is doing it.