[ILUG] Best Email Server to Use

[paul at clubi.ie]

On Fri, 1 Aug 2008, Colm Buckley wrote:

> headers are preserved.  The question remains; what information 
> should be captured when the *webmail* interface is used - should we 
> "pretend" that it's SMTP and make up a "Received" header for the 
> HTTP client?

SMTP is explicitely a gatewaying protocol. So it does anticipate that 
messages may come from other protocols, and does ask that gateways 
insert whatever useful return-path information they have.

4.4 of RFC2821 is probably the best place to start.

> In my opinion, the purpose of the Received: headers is clearly to 
> track the mail's progress by SMTP;

Examining the RFCs and considering behaviour of others, both 
historical behaviour in gatewaying mail into SMTP and current 
practice of other web->SMTP providers, may be more useful ;).

Its hard to think of good reasons for hiding origin of email. It 
wasn't a good idea in the 90s, with various CGI emailers. The privacy 
argument isn't very credible when Gmail is unusual in not providing 
trace information which the vast majority of gateways do provide..

regards,
-- 
Paul Jakma	paul at clubi.ie	paul at jakma.org	Key ID: 64A2FF6A
Fortune:
If you wish to succeed, consult three old people.