Subject: RE: Content-Length header and Multipart MIME

From: "Schroeder, Tim" <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 1 Feb 2000 16:23:05 -0600

>> However, if  6.6 states it as a MUST, which implies that a person who
sends
>> CR orLF only is not SIP compliant.

> It's one of the overarching philosophies of IETF protocols:
> be strict in what you generate, but lenient in what you accept.
> That way, for two implementations of a protocol to be
> non-interoperable, they must *both* be broken.

Or one of them must be broken in a way other than one of the few specific
minor ways in which it's "OK" to be broken, despite the fact that it's not
compliant to be broken.

> This is one of the reasons occasionally cited why IETF protocols
> tend to interoperate more sucessfully than those of other
> standards bodies.

Can't argue with that, though I have a lot of sympathy for the other side.
If I can't trust my counterpart to be able to follow the standard well
enough to send the proper CRLF (even though I can cover for it), can I trust
it to do anything right?

Tim.