usefor-article-11 June 2003
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8.6. Duties of a Followup Agent
A Followup Agent is a special case of a posting agent and as such is
bound by all the posting agent's requirements. Followup agents MUST
create valid followups and are subject to the following special
requirements involving certain inheritable (4.2.5.2) and other
headers.
1. The Newsgroups-header (5.5) SHOULD be initialized from the
precursor's Followup-To-header, if present, when preparing a
followup; however posters MAY then change this before posting if
they wish.
2. The Subject-content (5.4) of the precursor MAY (and usually will)
be prepended with the back-reference "Re: " (which is case
sensitive), unless that precursor is itself a followup with "Re: "
already present in its Subject-content; however posters MAY then
change this before posting if they wish.
Followup agents MUST NOT use any other string except "Re: " as a
back-reference, and specifically NOT a translation of "Re: " into
a local language, and they MUST NOT prepend a "Re: " if one is
already present.
[The provision of back-references and their allowed forms are still
under discussion in the Usefor Working Group.
The matter of a "Re: " occurring within an encoded-word needs to be
clarified.]
NOTE: "Re" is an abbreviation for the Latin "In re", meaning "in
the matter of", and not an abbreviation of "Reference" as is
sometimes erroneously supposed. Reading agents often take note
of a single "Re: " at the beginning of a Subject-content (for
example, in order to display a list of articles sorted by
Subject). These restrictions ensure that reading agents have no
need to recognize more than a single occurrence of "Re: ".
3. The Distribution-header (6.6) SHOULD be initialized from the
precursor's Distribution-header, if any; however posters MAY then
change this before posting if they wish.
4. If the precursor did not have a References-header (6.10), the
followup's References-content MUST be formed by the message
identifier of the precursor. A followup to an article which had a
References-header MUST have a References-header containing the
precursor's References-content (subject to trimming as described
below) plus the precursor's message identifier appended to the end
of the list (separated from it by CFWS).
Followup agents MAY trim References-headers which have grown to
excessive length, but the first and last message identifiers from
the precursor MUST NOT be removed.
5. If the precursor contains a Mail-Copies-To-header (6.8), The
actions to be taken, in accordance with the Mail-Copies-To-
content, (and subject to manual override by the poster) are as
follows:
"nobody" (or when the header is absent)
The followup agent SHOULD NOT email a copy of the followup
to the poster of the precursor.
"poster"
The followup agent SHOULD (if it has the necessary
capability) email a copy of the followup, which MUST then be
sent to the address(es) in the Reply-To-header, and in the
absence of that to the address(es) in the From-header.
a copy-addr
The followup agent SHOULD likewise email a copy of the
followup, which MUST then be sent to the copy-addr.
When emailing a copy, the followup agent SHOULD also include a
"Posted-And-Mailed: yes" header (6.9).
Followup agents MUST NOT attempt to send email to any address
ending in ".invalid".
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#Diff to first older
--- ../usefor-article-10/Duties_of_a_Followup_Agent.out April 2003
+++ ../usefor-article-11/Duties_of_a_Followup_Agent.out June 2003
@@ -1,22 +1,77 @@
8.6. Duties of a Followup Agent
A Followup Agent is a special case of a posting agent and as such is
- bound by all the posting agent's requirements plus additional ones.
- Followup agents MUST create valid followups, in particular by
- providing correctly adjusted forms of those headers described as
- inheritable (4.2.5.2), notably the Newsgroups-header (5.5), the
- Subject-header (5.4) and the References-header (6.10), and they Ought
- to observe appropriate quoting conventions in the body (see 4.3.2).
+ bound by all the posting agent's requirements. Followup agents MUST
+ create valid followups and are subject to the following special
+ requirements involving certain inheritable (4.2.5.2) and other
+ headers.
- Followup agents SHOULD initialize the Newsgroups-header from the
+ 1. The Newsgroups-header (5.5) SHOULD be initialized from the
precursor's Followup-To-header, if present, when preparing a
- followup; however posters MAY then change this before posting if they
- wish.
+ followup; however posters MAY then change this before posting if
+ they wish.
- Followup agents MUST NOT attempt to send email to any address ending
- in ".invalid". Followup agents SHOULD NOT email copies of the
- followup to the poster of the precursor unless this has been
- explicitly requested by means of a Mail-Copies-To-header (6.8), but
- they SHOULD include a Posted-And-Mailed-header (6.9) whenever a copy
- is so emailed.
+ 2. The Subject-content (5.4) of the precursor MAY (and usually will)
+ be prepended with the back-reference "Re: " (which is case
+ sensitive), unless that precursor is itself a followup with "Re: "
+ already present in its Subject-content; however posters MAY then
+ change this before posting if they wish.
+
+ Followup agents MUST NOT use any other string except "Re: " as a
+ back-reference, and specifically NOT a translation of "Re: " into
+ a local language, and they MUST NOT prepend a "Re: " if one is
+ already present.
+[The provision of back-references and their allowed forms are still
+under discussion in the Usefor Working Group.
+The matter of a "Re: " occurring within an encoded-word needs to be
+clarified.]
+
+ NOTE: "Re" is an abbreviation for the Latin "In re", meaning "in
+ the matter of", and not an abbreviation of "Reference" as is
+ sometimes erroneously supposed. Reading agents often take note
+ of a single "Re: " at the beginning of a Subject-content (for
+ example, in order to display a list of articles sorted by
+ Subject). These restrictions ensure that reading agents have no
+ need to recognize more than a single occurrence of "Re: ".
+
+ 3. The Distribution-header (6.6) SHOULD be initialized from the
+ precursor's Distribution-header, if any; however posters MAY then
+ change this before posting if they wish.
+
+ 4. If the precursor did not have a References-header (6.10), the
+ followup's References-content MUST be formed by the message
+ identifier of the precursor. A followup to an article which had a
+ References-header MUST have a References-header containing the
+ precursor's References-content (subject to trimming as described
+ below) plus the precursor's message identifier appended to the end
+ of the list (separated from it by CFWS).
+
+ Followup agents MAY trim References-headers which have grown to
+ excessive length, but the first and last message identifiers from
+ the precursor MUST NOT be removed.
+
+ 5. If the precursor contains a Mail-Copies-To-header (6.8), The
+ actions to be taken, in accordance with the Mail-Copies-To-
+ content, (and subject to manual override by the poster) are as
+ follows:
+
+ "nobody" (or when the header is absent)
+ The followup agent SHOULD NOT email a copy of the followup
+ to the poster of the precursor.
+
+ "poster"
+ The followup agent SHOULD (if it has the necessary
+ capability) email a copy of the followup, which MUST then be
+ sent to the address(es) in the Reply-To-header, and in the
+ absence of that to the address(es) in the From-header.
+
+ a copy-addr
+ The followup agent SHOULD likewise email a copy of the
+ followup, which MUST then be sent to the copy-addr.
+
+ When emailing a copy, the followup agent SHOULD also include a
+ "Posted-And-Mailed: yes" header (6.9).
+
+ Followup agents MUST NOT attempt to send email to any address
+ ending in ".invalid".