[Mimedefang] Re: SMTP Header Syntax question

Scott Silva ssilva at sgvwater.com
Mon Dec 11 17:32:47 EST 2006


Cormack, Ken spake the following on 12/11/2006 1:57 PM:
> Group,
> 
> I'm googling through the RFCs trying to find this (mainly RFC821 and 822),
> but perhaps one of you might be able to help narrow this down?  It's not a
> MIMEDefang question, per se, but we've got a customer trying to send us a
> programmatically-generated email, that is being blocked by our gateways.
> The arg being passed (to a sendmail rule that we have) indicates that the
> HEADER "To:" line has incorrect syntax as follows:
> 
> 	user1 at domain,user2 at domain,user3 at domain
> 
> Note the presence of commas, but and the absence of spaces, in the above.
> 
> I'm guessing that spaces are needed, but would like to be able to reference
> an RFC syntax quotation for the external developer, since both they and we
> maintain nothing has changed.
> 
> The particular sendmail rule we use is even older than our MIMEDefang
> deployment here, (has been in service and untouched for approx 6 years now).
> And I have a feeling the customer's program code has changed.  Without
> calling him a liar, I'd rather just be able to say "RFC such-and-such,
> section blah-blah-blah says this..."
> 
> Can anyone point me to a good reference on the structure of SMTP headers,
> specifically the Header "To:" field, and the allowed syntax for multiple
> recipients?
> 
> Thanks!
> 
> Ken
> 
RFC822 paragraph 3.4.2 deals with whitespace. 3.4.4 deals with phrases and
quoting, and the examples in the appendix clearly show a space after the comma
in multiple fields in the "To:". Paragraph 3.1.1 also mentions the space or
CRLF and space after a comma.


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