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IETF RFC 5183
Sieve Email Filtering: Environment Extension
Last modified on Wednesday, May 28th, 2008
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Network Working Group N. Freed
Request for Comments: 5183 Sun Microsystems
Category: Standards Track May 2008
Sieve Email Filtering: Environment Extension
 Status of This Memo
This document specifies an Internet standards track protocol for the
Internet community, and requests discussion and suggestions for
improvements. Please refer to the current edition of the "Internet
Official Protocol Standards" (STD 1) for the standardization state
and status of this protocol. Distribution of this memo is unlimited.
Abstract
This document describes the "environment" extension to the Sieve
email filtering language. The "environment" extension gives a Sieve
script access to information about the Sieve interpreter itself,
where it is running, and about any transport connection currently
involved in transferring the message.
1. Introduction
Sieve [RFC 5228] is a language for filtering email messages at or
around the time of final delivery. It is designed to be
implementable on either a mail client or mail server. It is suitable
for running on a mail server where users may not be allowed to
execute arbitrary programs, such as on black box Internet Message
Access Protocol [RFC 3501] servers, as it has no user-controlled loops
or the ability to run external programs.
Although Sieve is intended to be independent of access protocol, mail
architecture, and operating system, in some cases it is useful to
allow scripts to access information about their execution context.
The "environment" extension provides a new environment test that can
be used to implement scripts that behave differently when moved from
one system to another, when messages arrive from different remote
sources or when otherwise operated in different contexts.
2. Conventions Used in This Document
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
"SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
document are to be interpreted as described in [RFC 2119].
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RFC 5183 Sieve Environment Extension May 2008
The terms used to describe the various components of the Sieve
language are taken from Section 1.1 of [RFC 5228].
This document refers to the ABNF productions IPv4-address-literal,
IPv6-address-literal, and General-address-literal defined in Section
4.1.3 of [RFC 2821].
The location item makes use of standard terms for email service
components. Additional information and background on these terms can
be found in [EMAIL-ARCH].
3. Capability Identifiers
The capability string associated with the extension defined in this
document is "environment".
4. Environment Test
Usage: environment [COMPARATOR] [MATCH-TYPE]
<name: string>
<key-list: string-list>
The environment test retrieves the item of environment information
specified by the name string and matches it to the values specified
in the key-list argument. The test succeeds if a match occurs. The
type of match defaults to ":is" and the default comparator is
"i;ascii-casemap".
The current message is not a direct source of information for the
environment test; the item of information specified by the name
string is extracted from the script's operating environment and the
key-list argument comes from the script.
The environment test MUST fail unconditionally if the specified
information item does not exist. A script MUST NOT fail with an
error if the item does not exist. This allows scripts to be written
that handle nonexistent items gracefully. In particular, the test:
if environment :contains "item" "" { ... }
only succeeds if "item" is known to the implementation, and always
succeeds if it is.
The "relational" extension [RFC 5231] adds a match type called
":count". The count of an environment test is 0 if the environment
information returned is the empty string, or 1 otherwise.
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RFC 5183 Sieve Environment Extension May 2008
Environment items can be standardized or vendor-defined. An IANA
registry is defined for both types of items. Extensions designed for
interoperable use SHOULD be defined in standards track or
experimental RFCs.
4.1. Initial Standard Environment Items
The initial set of standardized environment items is as follows:
"domain" => The primary DNS domain associated with the Sieve
execution context, usually but not always a proper
suffix of the host name.
"host" => The fully-qualified domain name of the host where
the Sieve script is executing.
"location"
=> Sieve evaluation can be performed at various
different points as messages are processed. This item
provides additional information about the type of
service that is evaluating the script. Possible values
are "MTA", meaning the Sieve is being evaluated by a
Message Transfer Agent, "MDA", meaning evaluation is
being performed by a Mail Delivery Agent, "MUA",
meaning evaluation is being performed by a Mail User
Agent, and "MS", meaning evaluation is being performed
by a Message Store. Additional information and
background on these terms can be found in
[EMAIL-ARCH].
"name" => The product name associated with the Sieve interpreter.
"phase" => The point relative to final delivery where the
Sieve script is being evaluated. Possible values are
"pre", "during", and "post", referring respectively to
processing before, during, and after final delivery
has taken place.
"remote-host"
=> Host name of remote SMTP/LMTP/Submission client
expressed as a Fully Qualified Domain Name (FQDN),
if applicable and available. The empty string will be
returned if for some reason this information cannot be
obtained for the current client.
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RFC 5183 Sieve Environment Extension May 2008
"remote-ip"
=> IP address of remote SMTP/LMTP/Submission client, if
applicable and available. IPv4, IPv6, and other types
of addresses are respectively represented in the
formats defined by the IPv4-address-literal,
IPv6-address-literal, and General-address-literal
productions defined in Section 4.1.3 of [RFC 2821].
"version" => The product version associated with the Sieve
interpreter. The meaning of the product version string
is product-specific and should always be considered
in the context of the product name given by the
"name" item.
Implementations SHOULD support as many of the items on this initial
list as possible. Additional standardized items can only be defined
in standards-track or experimental RFCs.
4.2. Vendor-defined Environment Items
Environment item names beginning with "vnd." represent vendor-defined
extensions. Such extensions are not defined by Internet standards or
RFCs, but are still registered with IANA in order to prevent
conflicts.
4.3. IANA Registration of Environment Items
A registry of environment items is provided by IANA. Item names may
be registered on a first-come, first-served basis.
Groups of items defined in a standards track or experimental RFC MAY
choose to use a common name prefix of the form "name.", where "name"
is a string that identifies the group of related items.
Items not defined in a standards track or experimental RFC MUST have
a name that begins with the "vnd." prefix, and this prefix is
followed by the name of the vendor or product, such as
"vnd.acme.rocket-sled-status".
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RFC 5183 Sieve Environment Extension May 2008
4.3.1. Template for Environment Registrations
The following template is to be used for registering new Sieve
environment item names with IANA.
To: iana@iana.org
Subject: Registration of new Sieve environment item
Item name: [the string for use in the 'environment' test]
Description: [a brief description of the semantics of the
value the item returns]
RFC number: [for extensions published as RFCs]
Contact address: [email and/or physical address to contact for
additional information]
Multiple items and descriptions MAY be specified in a single
registration request. Both standardized and vendor-defined items use
this form.
5. Security Considerations
The environment extension may be used to obtain information about the
system the Sieve implementation is running on. This information in
turn may reveal details about service provider or enterprise
infrastructure.
An implementation can use any technique to determine the remote-host
environment item defined in this specification, and the
trustworthiness of the result will vary. One common method will be
to perform a PTR DNS lookup on the client IP address. This
information may come from an untrusted source. For example, the
test:
if environment :matches "remote-host" "*.example.com" { ... }
is not a good way to test whether the message came from "outside"
because anyone who can create a PTR record can create one that refers
to whatever domain they choose.
All of the security considerations given in the base Sieve
specification also apply to this extension.
Freed Standards Track PAGE 5
RFC 5183 Sieve Environment Extension May 2008
6. IANA Considerations
The following template specifies the IANA registration of the Sieve
extension specified in this document:
To: iana@iana.org
Subject: Registration of new Sieve extension
Capability name: environment
Description: The "environment" extension provides a new
environment test that can be used to implement
scripts that behave differently when moved
from one system to another or otherwise
operated in different contexts.
RFC number: RFC 5183
Contact address: Sieve discussion list <ietf-mta-filters@imc.org>
This specification also defines a new IANA registry for Sieve
environment item names. The specifics of this registry are given in
Section 4.3. The initial contents of the registry are given in the
following section.
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RFC 5183 Sieve Environment Extension May 2008
6.1. Initial Environment Item Registrations
The following template specifies the initial IANA registrations for
the environment items defined in this document:
To: iana@iana.org
Subject: Registration of new Sieve environment items
Capability name: domain
Description: The primary DNS domain associated with the Sieve
execution context, usually but not always a
proper suffix of the host name.
Capability name: host
Description: The fully-qualified domain name of the host
where the Sieve script is executing.
Capability name: location
Description: Type of service executing the Sieve script.
Capability name: name
Description: The product name associated with the Sieve
interpreter.
Capability name: phase
Description: Point relative to final delivery at which the
Sieve script is being evaluated.
Capability name: remote-host
Description: Host name of remote SMTP client, if applicable
and available.
Capability name: remote-ip
Description: IP address of remote SMTP client, if applicable
and available.
Capability name: version
Description: The product version associated with the Sieve
interpreter.
RFC number: RFC 5183
Contact address: Sieve discussion list <ietf-mta-filters@imc.org>
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RFC 5183 Sieve Environment Extension May 2008
7. References
7.1. Normative references
[RFC 2119] Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate
Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.
[RFC 2821] Klensin, J., "Simple Mail Transfer Protocol", RFC 2821,
April 2001.
[RFC 5228] Guenther, P. and T. Showalter, "Sieve: An Email
Filtering Language", RFC 5228, January 2008.
[RFC 5231] Segmuller, W. and B. Leiba, "Sieve Email Filtering:
Relational Extension", RFC 5231, January 2008.
7.2. Informative references
[EMAIL-ARCH] Crocker, D., "Internet Mail Architecture", Work
in Progress, February 2008.
[RFC 3501] Crispin, M., "INTERNET MESSAGE ACCESS PROTOCOL -
VERSION 4rev1", RFC 3501, March 2003.
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RFC 5183 Sieve Environment Extension May 2008
Appendix A. Acknowledgements
Brian Carpenter, Dave Crocker, Cyrus Daboo, Philip Guenther, Kjetil
Torgrim Homme, John Klensin, Mark Mallett, Alexey Melnikov, and
Dilyan Palauzo provided helpful suggestions and corrections.
Author's Address
Ned Freed
Sun Microsystems
3401 Centrelake Drive, Suite 410
Ontario, CA 92761-1205
USA
Phone: +1 909 457 4293
EMail: ned.freed@mrochek.com
Freed Standards Track PAGE 9
RFC 5183 Sieve Environment Extension May 2008
Full Copyright Statement
Copyright © The IETF Trust (2008).
This document is subject to the rights, licenses and restrictions
contained in BCP 78, and except as set forth therein, the authors
retain all their rights.
This document and the information contained herein are provided on an
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Freed Standards Track PAGE 10
Sieve Email Filtering: Environment Extension
RFC TOTAL SIZE: 16950 bytes
PUBLICATION DATE: Wednesday, May 28th, 2008
LEGAL RIGHTS: The IETF Trust (see BCP 78)
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