MBOX-Line: From dave at cridland.net  Wed Nov 16 00:33:08 2011
To: imap-protocol@u.washington.edu
From: Dave Cridland <dave@cridland.net>
Date: Fri Jun  8 12:34:47 2018
Subject: [Imap-protocol] SELECT/EXAMINE clarification of UNSEEN
In-Reply-To: <alpine.OSX.2.00.1111151800340.38075@hsinghsing.panda.com>
References: <C61A1BDF-03DD-4ED9-BFCA-C6183F07DD3E@mac.com>
	<alpine.OSX.1.10.1111141446070.8578@rastawifi.orthanc.ca>
	<1321311798.30750.140660998918417@webmail.messagingengine.com>
	<4EC1A0A5.8051.EFC2A39@David.Harris.pmail.gen.nz>
	<1321346922.6321.140660999083661@webmail.messagingengine.com>
	<4EC268D1.7010404@aol.com>
	<1321364880.3715.140660999182809@webmail.messagingengine.com>
	<alpine.OSX.2.00.1111151258420.38075@hsinghsing.panda.com>
	<20111115233902.GA1071@brong.net>
	<alpine.OSX.2.00.1111151543580.38075@hsinghsing.panda.com>
	<D454A5E5-BEDE-47E6-909B-2C90463835EE@iki.fi>
	<alpine.OSX.2.00.1111151800340.38075@hsinghsing.panda.com>
Message-ID: <29330.1321432388.123579@puncture>

On Wed Nov 16 02:24:17 2011, Mark Crispin wrote:
> My understanding is that Google perceived keywords as not commonly
> implemented, and thus needing to do view/mailbox mapping. It's been  
> a
> major problem; a classic case of kludge tower building because it  
> was
> perceived that they couldn't do it right to begin with.

I thought this at one point, but I recall seeing somewhere that the  
limitation was that keywords are pure ASCII, compared to mailbox  
names (and Google tags or whatever they're called) which are full  
unicode, contain spaces, etc.

Personally I think Google are big enough that fixing this problem  
"properly" (ie, a more free-text naming of FLAGS via the standards  
process) would have been viable, but the desire of many companies  
(Google included) to assume that marketing splash always trumps  
technical merit means that a kludge they can release without  
consultation trumps revealing some portion of the plan, or releasing  
incrementally, but with a better design.

I do understand the pressure, and sympathize with it, but I still  
find it annoying how little the technical argument counts for,  
especially when it's a standardization issue, and these companies are  
often too happy to talk about how much they support open standards.

Dave.
-- 
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