RFC 2449 (rfc2449) - Page 1 of 19
POP3 Extension Mechanism
Alternative Format: Original Text Document
Network Working Group R. Gellens
Request for Comments: 2449 Qualcomm
Updates: 1939 C. Newman
Category: Standards Track Innosoft
L. Lundblade
Qualcomm
November 1998
POP3 Extension Mechanism
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.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (C) The Internet Society (1998). All Rights Reserved.
IESG Note
This extension to the POP3 protocol is to be used by a server to
express policy descisions taken by the server administrator. It is
not an endorsement of implementations of further POP3 extensions
generally. It is the general view that the POP3 protocol should stay
simple, and for the simple purpose of downloading email from a mail
server. If more complicated operations are needed, the IMAP protocol
[RFC 2060] should be used. The first paragraph of section 7 should
be read very carefully.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
2. Conventions Used in this Document . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3. General Command and Response Grammar . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
4. Parameter and Response Lengths . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
5. The CAPA Command . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
6. Initial Set of Capabilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
6.1. TOP capability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
6.2. USER capability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
6.3. SASL capability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
6.4. RESP-CODES capability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
6.5. LOGIN-DELAY capability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
6.6. PIPELINING capability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Gellens, et. al. Standards Track