Re: SMTP question (not quite Gnus-related)

["Steven E. Harris" <steven.harris@tenzing.com>]

Kai.Grossjohann@CS.Uni-Dortmund.DE (Kai Großjohann) writes:

> Presumably, an SMTP server reading the DATA command will also read the
> <CRLF> that follows it.  Hence, the <CRLF> is not available for the
> subsequent end of data indication anymore.

Yes! That's exactly my point! The <CRLF> following DATA is already
"gone" by the time my stream starts eating bytes, so I have to either
start assuming I've just seen it, or start waiting for it.

If, as Kai suggests, we should take the terminator to only be
".<CRLF>," then that leaves the question about mail messages that
don't end with a <CRLF>. If the protocol requires an insertion of an
extra <CRLF> to get that period on a line of its own, then really that
extra <CRLF> should be stripped as part of the protocol decoding.

It makes for a messy state machine if you're trying to catch a
five-byte terminator, but want to permit a three-byte terminator right
from your start state. I have it worked out, but it's ugly. RFC821 has
been around long enough that I figured there must have been some
well-known discussion about this.

-- 
Steven E. Harris        :: steven.harris@tenzing.com
Tenzing                 :: http://www.tenzing.com