Subject: RE: participation in IETF meetings

From: Bill Fenner <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 24 Oct 2001 12:59:19 -0700

>If you would [...]
>then the rest of us could read your email  because it would be sent
>out as plain-text.

Ran,

  David's message was multipart/alternative MIME with a text/plain
part, which came first.  Reading it in a non-MIME-aware mail reader
would show the text/plain part first, with a little bit of MIME
jibberish in front of it.  Reading it in a decent MIME-aware mail
reader should give the version that you prefer; in your case
presumably it would be the text/plain alternative.

  I agree that the message did not require the text/html alternative
part, but if you could not read David's message your argument is with
your MUA, not with the way the message was formatted.

  Bill

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From: RJ Atkinson <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 24 Oct 2001 16:05:31 -0400

>your MUA, not with the way the message was formatted.

Bill,

        The argument is broader than that.  We have several folks
who participate in IETF from 2nd or 3rd world (pick your definition)
countries where their IP connectivity is 9.6 Kbps.  Sending plain-text
to them is OK.  Sending both plain-text and fancy-format burns lots
of bandwidth (= connect time = cost) for someone remote or behind
a narrow pipe.  IETF tries to be global, not just for a few relatively
rich countries -- part of being global is being accessible to all.
Or were we now suggesting that only folks with relatively high bandwidth
access should participate in IETF or should be WG Chairs ?

        Now beyond that the fancy format stuff was not a value-add 
in the email I griped about, as compared with plain-text, and 
did not need to be sent at all.  Lots of other folks have configured 
their mailers to only send plain text, as a matter of common courtesy,
even if one doesn't care about equal access to all participants
(obviously I do care about equal access).

        It is easy to reconfigure MS Outlook (or other common tools) 
to send only plain-text (not HTML, not both, not MS-RichText). 
Instructions for doing that are documented in the I-D that I referenced
(trying to be helpful, they are documented for several different
popular MUAs).  Credit where due, the vendors involved helped me
write up the proper documentation on how to configure their MUAs.

Ran
[email-masked]

---

From: RJ Atkinson <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 24 Oct 2001 16:37:11 -0400

>write up the proper documentation on how to configure their MUAs.

Credit also where due, David Harrington says he's tried/trying to
get his mailer configured differently than it was.  There are issues
that my draft apparently doesn't resolve; I'm getting details and
hope to get (additional) help from the vendor in identifying the
correct knob settings.  Then I'll spin my hints draft.

Ran

---

From: James M Galvin <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 24 Oct 2001 17:40:16 -0400 (EDT)

For those who think it's easy to configure email clients to send text
only, I refer you to the following, *lengthy*, web page:

    http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/1236/nomime.html

Enjoy,

Jim