Message Disposition Notification
RFC 3798, “Message Disposition Notification”, is a Draft Standard document published in May 2004 by T. Hansen, G. Vaudreuil. It updates RFC 2046, RFC 3461. It obsoletes RFC 2298. It has since been updated by RFC 5337, RFC 6533. It has been obsoleted by RFC 8098 — refer to the newer document for the authoritative version. The canonical text is published by the RFC Editor.
Abstract
This memo defines a MIME content-type that may be used by a mail user agent (MUA) or electronic mail gateway to report the disposition of a message after it has been successfully delivered to a recipient. This content-type is intended to be machine-processable. Additional message headers are also defined to permit Message Disposition Notifications (MDNs) to be requested by the sender of a message. The purpose is to extend Internet Mail to support functionality often found in other messaging systems, such as X.400 and the proprietary "LAN-based" systems, and often referred to as "read receipts," "acknowledgements", or "receipt notifications." The intention is to do this while respecting privacy concerns, which have often been expressed when such functions have been discussed in the past. Because many messages are sent between the Internet and other messaging systems (such as X.400 or the proprietary "LAN-based" systems), the MDN protocol is designed to be useful in a multi-protocol messaging environment. To this end, the protocol described in this memo provides for the carriage of "foreign" addresses, in addition to those normally used in Internet Mail. Additional attributes may also be defined to support "tunneling" of foreign notifications through Internet Mail. [STANDARDS-TRACK]
What “Draft Standard” means
A historical maturity level (retired in 2011) that sat between Proposed Standard and Internet Standard and required multiple interoperable implementations.
The canonical text of RFC 3798 is hosted at rfc-editor.org. Available in TXT,HTML.
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