RFC 5598: Internet Mail Architecture
In plain English — editorial summary, not part of the RFC
Over its thirty-five-year history, Internet Mail has changed significantly in scale and complexity, as it has become a global infrastructure service. These changes have been evolutionary, rather than revolutionary, reflecting a strong desire to preserve both its installed base and its usefulness. To collaborate productively on this large and complex system, all participants need to work from a common view of it and use a common language to describe its components and the interactions among them. But the many differences in perspective currently make it difficult to know exactly what another participant means. To serve as the necessary common frame of reference, this document describes the enhanced Internet Mail architecture, reflecting the current service. This memo provides information for the Internet community.
Document record
- Document ID
- RFC5598
- Published
- July 2009
- Authors
- D. Crocker
- Status
- INFORMATIONAL
- Stream
- IETF
- Area
- —
- Pages
- 54
- Also known as
- —
Topics
- service
- mime
- architecture
- mta
- mua
- msa
- mda
- admd
- user
- originator
- recipient
- transfer
- message transfer
- deliver
- delivery
- relay
- header
- gateway agent
- gateway actor
- gateway
- sieve
- dsn
- mdn
- tussle
- mhs
- Message handling service
- message transfer agent
- message user agent
- mail submission agent
- mail delivery agent
- administrative management domain
Related documents
Ranked automatically by shared keywords, IETF area and stream — not by editorial selection.
- RFC 5068Email Submission Operations: Access and Accountability RequirementsUpdated
November 2007
- RFC 9228Delivered-To Email Header FieldCurrent
April 2022
- RFC 5617DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) Author Domain Signing Practices (ADSP)Updated
August 2009
- RFC 3249Implementers Guide for Facsimile Using Internet MailCurrent
September 2002
- RFC 5322Internet Message FormatUpdated
October 2008
- RFC 6376DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) SignaturesUpdated
September 2011
- RFC 6377DomainKeys Identified Mail (DKIM) and Mailing ListsCurrent
September 2011
- RFC 5194Framework for Real-Time Text over IP Using the Session Initiation Protocol (SIP)Current
June 2008
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The document record above — title, authors, date, status, stream, area, relationships, DOI and errata — is imported verbatim from the public RFC Editor index. The “in plain English” section is editorial: written by The metasystema editorial team, not part of the RFC. Where the two differ, the RFC text governs.
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