Mail Archives: cygwin/2004/12/10/13:15:34
I have been doing some reading today, and have come across RFC3676
(which supersedes RFC2646) which describes format=flowed.
http://www.faqs.org/rfcs/rfc3676.html
A bit of a revelation.
format=flowed wasn't what I thought it might be, but it turned out to be
much better.
It doesn't look that complicated but it's actually a brilliant piece of
e-mail engineering.
format=flowed would appear to solve all the issues mentioned in the
thread earlier this year.
Messages using format=flowed will look just like like 80-column mail to
all the old curmudgeons.
However when viewed in a reader which understands format=flowed,
paragraphs will be re-flowed to the width of the reader's window.
Message quoting, using ">" is handled beautifully, with even quoted
messages being able to be perfectly re-flowed to the reader's window size.
And the best part:
The Cygwin mailing list web archiving system already supports it.
Any message using format=flowed will be emitted beautifully by the web
archiving system, resulting in lovely flowed paragraphs, including
quoted messages which will be flowed and presented with quote-bars.
For an example of how format=flowed works with a quoted message, look at
one of Andrew DeFaria's messages:
http://cygwin.com/ml/cygwin/2004-07/msg00266.html
Andrew appears to have been using Thunderbird 0.7.2.
I was using Microsoft Outlook Express, which does not support format=flowed.
I am now using Thunderbird 1.0, which does support format=flowed.
So *this* message should come out nicely for everyone, both in e-mail
and in the archive, *and* with no extra effort required on my part.
Marvellous!
Bill
--
William Blunn <bill at tao-group.com>
Tao, 62/63 Suttons Business Park, Earley, Reading, RG6 1AZ, UK
Tel: +44 845 644 4458, Fax: +44 845 644 4459, Web: http://tao-group.com/
The contents of this e-mail and any attachments are confidential and may
be legally privileged. If you have received this e-mail and you are not
a named addressee, please inform us as soon as possible on
+44 118 901 2999 and then delete the e-mail from your system. If you are
not a named addressee you must not copy, use, disclose, distribute,
print or rely on this e-mail. Any views expressed in this e-mail or any
attachments may not necessarily reflect those of Tao's management.
Although we routinely screen for viruses, addressees should scan this
e-mail and any attachments for viruses. Tao makes no representation or
warranty as to the absence of viruses in this e-mail or any attachments.
Please note that for the protection of our business, we may monitor and
read e-mails sent to and from our server(s).
--
Unsubscribe info: http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple
Problem reports: http://cygwin.com/problems.html
Documentation: http://cygwin.com/docs.html
FAQ: http://cygwin.com/faq/
- Raw text -