Re: MML multipart tag -- what does it do?

[Simon Josefsson <jas@extundo.com>]

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

> Okay, the examples in the emacs-mime info file are fairly clear.  But
> what they leave open to interpretation: suppose I compose a message,
> and the very first line of the body is a multipart tag, followed by a
> couple of part tags.
> 
> What does the whole message look like that comes out?

At the top-level it's a multipart that contains a couple of parts.

> You see, if I just put several part tags in the body, then I get a
> multipart/mixed message, so maybe the same thing happens with a
> multipart tag.
> 
> I kinda suspect that under some circumstances the top-level MML tag
> will become the Content-Type of the whole message, whereas under some
> circumstances the Content-Type of the whole message will me
> multipart/mixed with the MML tags given as `children' of that.

You can't have more than one MIME part in a message without some kind
of multipart.  So if you put more than one <part> in your message, it
implicitely adds a <multipart> at the top.

Maybe what's confusing is the </part> tag -- I don't think it's ever
necessary.  Maybe because there is a close tag you might believe it's
possible to say e.g.

<part>
foo
<part>
bar
</part>
</part>

which isn't unreasonable, but it doesn't work that way.  Maybe the
Insert/Attach/etc commands shouldn't insert </part> or </multipart>,
just because they only add confusion and no semantic.

All the MML commands ends when a new command of the same type is
inserted, I think.  There's no need for </part> or </multipart>.
Maybe someone could try to come up with a counter-example..