RE: Little help on email using SNDDST or QtmmSendMail

[Scott Klement <midrange-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi Tom,

> I referenced RFC1521 because it seemed a reasonable starting place. Is
> it obsoleted in the sense that the descriptions are no longer valid at
> all or that they have been enhanced, expanded, etc.?

I didn't do any comparing to see what changed between RFC1521 and the new
set of RFCs.

In general, when they replace old RFCs with new ones, they're usually
similar, but the new ones have been updated with what has been learned in
the intervening time.  The new RFC will have all of the relevant info, you
won't need to look back at the old one.

Things that were unclear in the old version may be clarified, things that
didn't work may be removed, etc.  Sometimes new requirements are added.


> I've only skimmed later RFCs once I realized how much 're-inventing the
> wheel' was involved. Obviously, to actually create an e-mail system that
> fully supports MIME, etc., requires attention to the details, including
> 'MAY', 'SHOULD' and 'MUST' for example. But how much attention to detail
> is needed otherwise, beyond some terminology and overall concepts? Would
> RFC1521 be misleading in that case?

As I said, I didn't compare the differences between them.

Most likely, the knowledge you learned from RFC1521 will still work. If
nothing else, they usually keep things backward compatible unless a major
version number is changed (which is not the case, here.)

If, however, you're going to start learning from the beginning, you might
as well learn the new one.  I don't see any advantage to learning
something that was already declared "obsolete" when the new one is readily
available.