Re: STARTTLS & EHLO

[Paul Smith <[e-mail]>]

Tony Finch wrote:
> On Wed, 28 Jan 2009, Paul Smith wrote:
>   
>> To me, it was (initially) 'clear' that the example saying 'such as the
>> argument to the EHLO command', was precise enough to imply that the fact
>> that the EHLO command was sent should not be discarded. It could have
>> said 'such as the EHLO command', but it went out of its way to say '*the
>> argument to* the EHLO command'.
>>     
>
> But there's plenty of other information that the server has to discard -
> for example any AUTH results, any partial MAIL transactions - which isn't
> explicitly listed in RFC 3207.
>   
Yes, but it has an example which was more specific than it needed to be
if it just meant 'forget that anything ever happened, and start the
session again from scratch' (other than obviously the fact that STARTTLS
was sent).

It's like saying 'cars, such as blue Honda Civics, aren't allowed over
this bridge'. Does this mean that just blue Honda Civics aren't allowed
over the bridge, or cars that look like that aren't allowed, or blue
cars, or Honda Civics, or all Hondas, or all cars? The 'such as blue
Honda Civics' confuses the statement, rather than clarifying it.

I'm not arguing what RFC 3207 means, just that I don't think it's as
clear as it could be.

-- 
Paul Smith

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