Network Working Group R. Sparks
Internet-Draft Tekelec
Intended status: Informational Feb 29, 2012
Expires: September 1, 2012
IMAP Access to IETF Email List Archives
draft-sparks-genarea-imaparch-01
Abstract
The IETF makes heavy use of email lists to conduct its work. This
often involves accessing the archived history of those email lists.
Participants would like to have the ability to browse and search
those archives using standard IMAP clients. This memo captures the
requirements for providing a service that would allow such browsing
and searching.
Status of this Memo
This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the
provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.
Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute
working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet-
Drafts is at http://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.
Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any
time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference
material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."
This Internet-Draft will expire on September 1, 2012.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2012 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
document authors. All rights reserved.
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
Provisions Relating to IETF Documents
(http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of
publication of this document. Please review these documents
carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect
to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must
include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of
the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as
Sparks Expires September 1, 2012 [Page 1]
Internet-Draft IMAP Access to IETF Email List Archives Feb 2012
described in the Simplified BSD License.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2. Requirements for IMAP access to archived IETF lists . . . . . . 3
3. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
4. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
5. Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
6. Changelog . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
6.1. 00 to 01 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
6.2. 00 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
7. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Author's Address . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Sparks Expires September 1, 2012 [Page 2]
Internet-Draft IMAP Access to IETF Email List Archives Feb 2012
1. Introduction
The IETF makes heavy use of email lists to conduct its work. This
often involves accessing the archived history of those email lists.
Work is underway to improve the web-based browsing and searching of
these archives [I-D.sparks-genarea-mailarch]. Participants would
like to have the ability to browse and search those archives using
standard IMAP clients. This memo captures the requirements for
providing a service that would allow such browsing and searching.
Discussion of this memo should take place on the ietf@ietf.org
mailing list.
2. Requirements for IMAP access to archived IETF lists
Many participants would prefer to access the list archives using IMAP
[RFC3501]. Providing this access while meeting the following
requirements will likely require an IMAP server with specialized
capabilities.
o The system should expose the archive using an IMAP interface, with
each list represented as a mailbox.
o This interface must work with standard IMAP clients.
o The interface should allow users to each have their own read/
unread marks for messages. Allowing other annotation is
desirable.
o The interface must have server-side searching enabled, and should
support multiple simultaneous extensive searches. The server
should facilitate the enhanced search capabilities described in
[I-D.sparks-genarea-mailarch]
o When the system requires credentials, it must use the
datatracker's authentication system
- While the vast majority of archived lists have an open access
policy, some archived lists have restricted archives. The
system must make it possible to limit access to a restricted
archive based on login credentials.
3. Security Considerations
Allowing IMAP as an interface for browsing and searching the archives
of IETF email lists does not affect the security of the Internet in
Sparks Expires September 1, 2012 [Page 3]
Internet-Draft IMAP Access to IETF Email List Archives Feb 2012
any significant fashion.
4. IANA Considerations
This document has no actions for IANA.
5. Acknowledgements
This text was derived directly from an earlier version of
[I-D.sparks-genarea-mailarch] which incorporated text suggestions
from Alexey Melnikov, Pete Resnick, and S. Moonesamy.
6. Changelog
6.1. 00 to 01
1. Added requirements to enable controlled access to restricted
archives based on credentials
2. Generalized the requirement to use the datatracker's credentials.
6.2. 00
1. Split this set of requirements out from the mailarch doc so that
this project could be pursued separately
7. Informative References
[I-D.sparks-genarea-mailarch]
Sparks, R., "IETF Email List Archiving and Search Tool
Requirements", draft-sparks-genarea-mailarch-04 (work in
progress), February 2012.
[RFC3501] Crispin, M., "INTERNET MESSAGE ACCESS PROTOCOL - VERSION
4rev1", RFC 3501, March 2003.
Sparks Expires September 1, 2012 [Page 4]
Internet-Draft IMAP Access to IETF Email List Archives Feb 2012
Author's Address
Robert Sparks
Tekelec
17210 Campbell Road
Suite 250
Dallas, Texas 75254-4203
USA
Email: RjS@nostrum.com
Sparks Expires September 1, 2012 [Page 5]