Note: The "Reply-To" field is added by the originator and
serves to direct replies, whereas the "Return-Path"
field is used to identify a path back to the origina-
tor.
While the syntax indicates that a route specification is
optional, every attempt should be made to provide that infor-
mation in this field.
4.3.2. RECEIVED
A copy of this field is added by each transport service that
relays the message. The information in the field can be quite
useful for tracing transport problems.
The names of the sending and receiving hosts and time-of-
receipt may be specified. The "via" parameter may be used, to
indicate what physical mechanism the message was sent over,
such as Arpanet or Phonenet, and the "with" parameter may be
used to indicate the mail-, or connection-, level protocol
that was used, such as the SMTP mail protocol, or X.25 tran-
sport protocol.
Note: Several "with" parameters may be included, to fully
specify the set of protocols that were used.
Some transport services queue mail; the internal message iden-
tifier that is assigned to the message may be noted, using the
"id" parameter. When the sending host uses a destination
address specification that the receiving host reinterprets, by
August 13, 1982 - 20 - RFC #822
Standard for ARPA Internet Text Messages
expansion or transformation, the receiving host may wish to
record the original specification, using the "for" parameter.
For example, when a copy of mail is sent to the member of a
distribution list, this parameter may be used to record the
original address that was used to specify the list.
4.4. ORIGINATOR FIELDS
The standard allows only a subset of the combinations possi-
ble with the From, Sender, Reply-To, Resent-From, Resent-Sender,
and Resent-Reply-To fields. The limitation is intentional.
4.4.1. FROM / RESENT-FROM
This field contains the identity of the person(s) who wished
this message to be sent. The message-creation process should
default this field to be a single, authenticated machine
address, indicating the AGENT (person, system or process)
entering the message. If this is not done, the "Sender" field
MUST be present. If the "From" field IS defaulted this way,
the "Sender" field is optional and is redundant with the
"From" field. In all cases, addresses in the "From" field
must be machine-usable (addr-specs) and may not contain named
lists (groups).
4.4.2. SENDER / RESENT-SENDER
This field contains the authenticated identity of the AGENT
(person, system or process) that sends the message. It is
intended for use when the sender is not the author of the mes-
sage, or to indicate who among a group of authors actually
sent the message. If the contents of the "Sender" field would
be completely redundant with the "From" field, then the
"Sender" field need not be present and its use is discouraged
(though still legal). In particular, the "Sender" field MUST
be present if it is NOT the same as the "From" Field.
The Sender mailbox specification includes a word sequence
which must correspond to a specific agent (i.e., a human user
or a computer program) rather than a standard address. This
indicates the expectation that the field will identify the
single AGENT (person, system, or process) responsible for
sending the mail and not simply include the name of a mailbox
from which the mail was sent. For example in the case of a
shared login name, the name, by itself, would not be adequate.
The local-part address unit, which refers to this agent, is
expected to be a computer system term, and not (for example) a
generalized person reference which can be used outside the
network text message context.
August 13, 1982 - 21 - RFC #822
Standard for ARPA Internet Text Messages
Since the critical function served by the "Sender" field is
identification of the agent responsible for sending mail and
=14= |