[LINK] Why www.etc?

[Kim Holburn]

On 2007/Dec/06, at 11:41 PM, Jan Whitaker wrote:

> At 10:52 AM 6/12/2007, Glen Turner wrote:
>>   gdt at its  -- if the sender was in the University of Adelaide
>> and this was seen as an advantage in an age where e-mail addresses  
>> were
>> typed.
>
> This approach to email also mimics real mail. It made it quite easy  
> for me to teach people how to conceptually construct one. Doesn't  
> mean they got them typed correctly as there is no standard except  
> for the @, country code, and the top level domain.

Not true, there are RFCs that specify email addresses and DNS names.   
In certain circumstances as Glen pointed out you don't need TLDs or  
even the host part of the address, for instance it used to be the  
case that if emailing someone on the same server: you could just use  
their user name (without even an @), someone in the same domain: just  
their name at host.  In these days of anti-spam measures you can't  
usually do that any more.

> Every other component can be almost anything that avoid the set of  
> special characters.

The domain name/host name part has a more restricted character set  
than the username.  Domain names have their own RFCs.  Domain name  
parts of email have special characters like . and can have [] and  
even ! that used to be part of host addresses.  That said "()<>@ are  
special characters in any part of an email address.    It's all in  
the RFCs.

> Even the @ I believe can be substituted with +. I just learned that  
> recently when setting up a new email account, but that may not be  
> universal.

It's not true.  In fact many people use + in their user-name as part  
of an anti-spam method.

--
Kim Holburn
IT Network & Security Consultant
Ph: +39 06 855 4294  M: +39 3494957443
mailto:kim at holburn.net  aim://kimholburn
skype://kholburn - PGP Public Key on request

Democracy imposed from without is the severest form of tyranny.
                           -- Lloyd Biggle, Jr. Analog, Apr 1961