Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[William Perry]

Per Abrahamsen writes:
>
>Here is a patch that allows Gnus to handle mailto URLs of the form:
>
>	<URL:mailto:list-request@your.smartlisthost?Subject=subscribe>
>
>It seems to be an undocumented Netscape extension, but I might be
>wrong about that.  Maybe wmperry knows.

  It is definitely a netscape 'extension'.  Jamie Z. recently posted the
closest thing to a spec they apparently have in house.  This was on the
www-html mailing list.  Basically, you can have _any_ arbitrary header in
the part of the query, so you could have:

<mailto:wmperry@aventail.com?CC=support@aventail.com?subject=dork>

-Bill P.

mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[Per Abrahamsen]

Here is a patch that allows Gnus to handle mailto URLs of the form:

	<URL:mailto:list-request@your.smartlisthost?Subject=subscribe>

It seems to be an undocumented Netscape extension, but I might be
wrong about that.  Maybe wmperry knows.

Mon Oct 21 14:50:11 1996  Per Abrahamsen  <abraham@dina.kvl.dk>

	* gnus-art.el (gnus-button-reply): Handle Netscape `?subject='
	mailto urls.

cd ~/emacs/rgnus/lisp/
diff -c gnus-art.el~ gnus-art.el 
*** gnus-art.el~	Tue Oct  8 12:47:05 1996
--- gnus-art.el	Mon Oct 21 14:48:31 1996
***************
*** 1839,1845 ****
  
  (defun gnus-button-reply (address)
    ;; Reply to ADDRESS.
!   (message-reply address))
  
  (defun gnus-button-url (address)
    "Browse ADDRESS."
--- 1839,1850 ----
  
  (defun gnus-button-reply (address)
    ;; Reply to ADDRESS.
!   (let ((case-fold-search t))
!     (if (string-match "\\`\\(.*\\)\\?subject=\\(.*\\)\\'" address)
! 	(let ((to (match-string 1 address))
! 	      (subject (match-string 2 address)))
! 	  (message-mail to subject))
!       (message-reply address))))
  
  (defun gnus-button-url (address)
    "Browse ADDRESS."

Compilation exited abnormally with code 1 at Mon Oct 21 14:48:51

Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[Steinar Bang]

>>>>> William Perry <wmperry@aventail.com>:

> Per Abrahamsen writes:

>> Here is a patch that allows Gnus to handle mailto URLs of the form:

>> <URL:mailto:list-request@your.smartlisthost?Subject=subscribe>

>> It seems to be an undocumented Netscape extension, but I might be
>> wrong about that.  Maybe wmperry knows.

> It is definitely a netscape 'extension'.  Jamie Z. recently posted
> the closest thing to a spec they apparently have in house.  This was
> on the www-html mailing list.

Hum, yes.  If I remember correctly, it was never meant to be
published.  It was just meant as a hidden implementation detail,
because they used the same code to do several things.

Or somesuch...

Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[William Perry]

Steinar Bang writes:
>>>>>> William Perry <wmperry@aventail.com>:
>
>> Per Abrahamsen writes:
>
>>> Here is a patch that allows Gnus to handle mailto URLs of the form:
>
>>> <URL:mailto:list-request@your.smartlisthost?Subject=subscribe>
>
>>> It seems to be an undocumented Netscape extension, but I might be
>>> wrong about that.  Maybe wmperry knows.
>
>> It is definitely a netscape 'extension'.  Jamie Z. recently posted
>> the closest thing to a spec they apparently have in house.  This was
>> on the www-html mailing list.
>
>Hum, yes.  If I remember correctly, it was never meant to be published.
>It was just meant as a hidden implementation detail, because they used the
>same code to do several things.

  The only reason I believe that is because I heard it from Jamie. :)

-Bill P.

Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen]

Steinar Bang <sb@metis.no> writes:

> Hum, yes.  If I remember correctly, it was never meant to be
> published.  It was just meant as a hidden implementation detail,
> because they used the same code to do several things.

So should I apply the patch or not? 

-- 
  "Yes.  The journey through the human heart 
     would have to wait until some other time."

Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[John Griffith]

>> "WP" == William Perry <wmperry@aventail.com> writes:

WP> It is definitely a netscape 'extension'.

WP> Basically, you can have _any_ arbitrary header in the part of the
WP> query, so you could have:

WP> <mailto:wmperry@aventail.com?CC=support@aventail.com?subject=dork>

I don't have netscape 3.0 around here, but in 2.0 (for unix)
apparently you can have only 1 header.  The above URL gives me a "CC"
value of "support@aventail.com?subject=dork" and no subject.

Also it doesn't seem to allow arbitrary header names.

Yuck, I just noticed that I when I send mail with netscape I get an
"X-URL" header pointing to the page I was on when I opened the mail
window.  I guess I better be careful not to send messages to my boss
from netscape when I'm right in the middle of browsing playboy.com.  I
thought "X-URL" was supposed to be for *my* URL!?!  Guess not.  I
guess this is so you can tell if someone clicked on your page's mail
button to send you mail.

Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[Lars Balker Rasmussen]

John Griffith <griffith@sfs.nphil.uni-tuebingen.de> writes:
> >> "WP" == William Perry <wmperry@aventail.com> writes:
> WP> Basically, you can have _any_ arbitrary header in the part of the
> WP> query, so you could have:
> 
> WP> <mailto:wmperry@aventail.com?CC=support@aventail.com?subject=dork>
> 
> I don't have netscape 3.0 around here, but in 2.0 (for unix)
> apparently you can have only 1 header.  The above URL gives me a "CC"
> value of "support@aventail.com?subject=dork" and no subject.

Solaris 2.5/Netscape 3.0 has the same behaviour.  I guess noone can be
surprised that Netscape can't implement their own specs correctly.

I don't think Gnus should cater too much for broken NS/IE behaviour;  in
any case, I have never seen the above in a message.
-- 
Lars Balker Rasmussen                                              - Duck!
<URL:http://www.daimi.aau.dk/~gnort/>                              - Where!?!

Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[Steinar Bang]

>>>>> Lars Magne Ingebrigtsen <larsi@ifi.uio.no>:

> Steinar Bang <sb@metis.no> writes:
>> Hum, yes.  If I remember correctly, it was never meant to be
>> published.  It was just meant as a hidden implementation detail,
>> because they used the same code to do several things.

> So should I apply the patch or not? 

I can't see it doing any harm, and the functionality it provides is
useful (note: I'm not saying it's the right way of doing it, only that
I can't think of any objections, from where I'm sitting)

Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[Steven L Baur]

>>>>> "John" == John Griffith <griffith@sfs.nphil.uni-tuebingen.de> writes:

John> I thought "X-URL" was supposed to be for *my* URL!?!  Guess not.

It's an X- header.  It can have whatever meaning you (or anyone else)
assigns to it.
-- 
steve@miranova.com baur
Unsolicited commercial e-mail will be billed at $250/message.
What are the last two letters of "doesn't" and "can't"?
Coincidence?  I think not.

Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[John Griffith]

>> "SLB" == Steven L Baur <steve@miranova.com> writes:
>> "John" == John Griffith <griffith@sfs.nphil.uni-tuebingen.de> writes:

John> I thought "X-URL" was supposed to be for *my* URL!?!  Guess not.

SLB> It's an X- header.  It can have whatever meaning you (or anyone else)
SLB> assigns to it.

True.  RFC-822 forbids officially published field names from beginning
with "X-" which makes them safe for user-defined purposes, but still
it seems that there are some pseudo standards among "X-" fields.  You
for instance, apparently use "X-Url" for your homepage.  This seems to
be such a common usage that some people who use BBDB collect this
information for addresses in their database.  Now to be "more"
accurate, I would have to notice whether or not the message was sent
from Netscape.  Of course Netscape's use of "X-Url" would also allow
me to infer (to some degree) that someone clicked the mail button on
one of my pages and which page it was.  This seems like a nice
feature.  However, it would have been nice if Netscape had picked a
different field name, but I don't deny their right to use "X-Url" for
this purpose.

Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[Steven L Baur]

>>>>> "John" == John Griffith <griffith@sfs.nphil.uni-tuebingen.de> writes:
>>>>> "SLB" == Steven L Baur <steve@miranova.com> writes:

John> I thought "X-URL" was supposed to be for *my* URL!?!  Guess not.

SLB> It's an X- header.  It can have whatever meaning you (or anyone else)
SLB> assigns to it.

John> but still it seems that there are some pseudo standards among
John> "X-" fields.  You for instance, apparently use "X-Url" for your
John> homepage.  This seems to be such a common usage that some people
John> who use BBDB collect this information for addresses in their
John> database.

It's a convention used by exmh (the MH frontend I used prior to
switching to Gnus for email).  I don't know where Brent Welch picked
it up from, maybe Wes knows.  A header of that type is turned into a
nice clickable button on the X-Faces line.  I submitted the patch to
Gnus to make it work in a similar way, so I guess you could blame me
for that.  But absolutely count on Netscape to ignore existing usage
and reinvent the wheel in their own fashion :-(.
-- 
steve@miranova.com baur
Unsolicited commercial e-mail will be billed at $250/message.
What are the last two letters of "doesn't" and "can't"?
Coincidence?  I think not.

Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[Per Abrahamsen]

I believe Netscape (or Mosaic) introduced the X-URL header.

Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[Colin Rafferty]

>>> "JG" == John Griffith <griffith@sfs.nphil.uni-tuebingen.de> writes:
>>> "WP" == William Perry <wmperry@aventail.com> writes:

WP> This was a screwup on my part- that URL should look like:

WP> <mailto:wmperry@aventail.com?CC=support@aventail.com&subject=dork>

JG> Well, this works for me, but it still does not allow _any_ arbitrary
JG> header. So the following doesn't work:

JG> <mailto:griffith?subject=hi&cc=griffith&x-dork=true>

JG> The all-important "X-dork" header doesn't get included.

Then netscape must be broken.

Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[John Griffith]

>> "WP" == William Perry <wmperry@aventail.com> writes:

WP>   This was a screwup on my part- that URL should look like:
 
WP> <mailto:wmperry@aventail.com?CC=support@aventail.com&subject=dork>
 
Well, this works for me, but it still does not allow _any_ arbitrary
header. So the following doesn't work:

<mailto:griffith?subject=hi&cc=griffith&x-dork=true>

The all-important "X-dork" header doesn't get included.

Re: mailto:address?subject=subject URL support

[William Perry]

Lars Balker Rasmussen writes:
>John Griffith <griffith@sfs.nphil.uni-tuebingen.de> writes:
>> >> "WP" == William Perry <wmperry@aventail.com> writes:
>> WP> Basically, you can have _any_ arbitrary header in the part of the
>> WP> query, so you could have:
>> 
>> 
>> I don't have netscape 3.0 around here, but in 2.0 (for unix)
>> apparently you can have only 1 header.  The above URL gives me a "CC"
>> value of "support@aventail.com?subject=dork" and no subject.
>
>Solaris 2.5/Netscape 3.0 has the same behaviour.  I guess noone can be
>surprised that Netscape can't implement their own specs correctly.
 
  This was a screwup on my part- that URL should look like:
 
<mailto:wmperry@aventail.com?CC=support@aventail.com&subject=dork>
 
  Typing too fast.
 
-Bill P.