jdow wrote:
From: "Mike Dewhirst" <miked@dewhirst.com.au>
suse@rio.vg wrote:
Anders Johansson wrote:
On Tuesday 15 August 2006 01:28, ken wrote:
I'll say it again another way. One side is arguing that replying to the list makes more sense. The other side keeps coming back to a notion of what is "correct". Did you read the article I linked to? I'll give you the link again
http://www.unicom.com/pw/reply-to-harmful.html
The argument is entirely based upon what makes sense. No one talks about being more or less "correct", that's for the debate between top and bottom posting
I read it, and frankly it's a load of bollocks. His argument doesn't even make sense. He says "Reply-to-all" is better, but, in fact, that would probably send the e-mail twice to the author (once direct, once through the mailing list), and possibly screw up threads if the author then replies to the e-mail he got directly from the sender, rather than over the list...
But this guy sounds like he hasn't come anywhere near the 21st century.
This whole argument is pointless. It's like saying driving on the right or the left side of the road in different countries is "broken".
It is pointless because RFCs (Requests for *Comment*) are what pass for actual internet standards. Once RFCs have been published, unless they leave wiggle-room for future developments, money, time, blood, sweat and tears get invested accordingly. That is what locks them down.
Merely publishing an RFC does not make it an Internet Standard. Some
My point is that investment in software is what creates inertia and momentum on the "standards" track. You (or the net total of all desires on the suse list) cannot change that. Don't tilt at windmills :) You can change your mail client to one which does what you personally want. If you can't find one then ask others to contribute towards making one which suits your needs. That's the open source way.
RFCs have become Internet Standards and the IETF is a little dumb to let them remain as RFCs rather than formally making them standards.
The rationale is that software development drives the process. The RFC follows and tries to pick the right path to "standardising" the interfaces so we don't get the tower of babel across the wires. They remain as RFCs for a long time precisely so that ongoing software development can stick to the beaten API path for the most part but can still innovate off the path. Usually one RFC is superceded by a later one which embeds the good (in the IETF's opinion) innovations but still retains RFC status until the cows come home or no innovations occur or the entire technology is replaced.
If we had to follow RFCs just because they were published you'd be speaking TCP/IP over homing pigeon relay at least some of the time.
I think you mean "If we didn't follow RFCs ..." Mike
{^_^}