The primary consideration in choosing an article format is
that it fit in with existing tools as well as possible.
Existing tools include both implementations of mail and
news. (The notesfiles system from the University of
Illinois is considered a news implementation.) A standard
format for mail messages has existed for many years on the
ARPANET, and this format meets most of the needs of
USENET. Since the ARPANET format is extensible,
extensions to meet the additional needs of USENET are
easily made within the ARPANET standard. Therefore, the
rule is adopted that all USENET news articles must be
formatted as valid ARPANET mail messages, according to the
ARPANET standard RFC 822. This standard is more
restrictive than the ARPANET standard, placing additional
requirements on each article and forbidding use of certain
ARPANET features. However, it should always be possible
to use a tool expecting an ARPANET message to process a
news article. In any situation where this standard
conflicts with the ARPANET standard, RFC 822 should be
considered correct and this standard in error.
An example message is included to illustrate the fields.
Relay-Version: version B 2.10 2/13/83; site cbosgd.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10 2/13/83; site eagle.UUCP
Path: cbosgd!mhuxj!mhuxt!eagle!jerry
From: jerry@eagle.uucp (Jerry Schwarz)
Newsgroups: net.general
Subject: Usenet Etiquette -- Please Read
Message-ID: <642@eagle.UUCP>
Date: Friday, 19-Nov-82 16:14:55 EST
Followup-To: net.news
Expires: Saturday, 1-Jan-83 00:00:00 EST
Date-Received: Friday, 19-Nov-82 16:59:30 EST
Organization: Bell Labs, Murray Hill
The body of the article comes here, after a blank line.
Here is an example of a message in the old format (before
the existence of this standard). It is recommended that
implementations also accept articles in this format to
ease upward conversion.
From: cbosgd!mhuxj!mhuxt!eagle!jerry (Jerry Schwarz)
Newsgroups: net.general
Title: Usenet Etiquette -- Please Read
Article-I.D.: eagle.642
Posted: Fri Nov 19 16:14:55 1982
Received: Fri Nov 19 16:59:30 1982
Expires: Mon Jan 1 00:00:00 1990
The body of the article comes here, after a blank line.
Some news systems transmit news in the "A" format, which
looks like this:
Aeagle.642
net.general
cbosgd!mhuxj!mhuxt!eagle!jerry
Fri Nov 19 16:14:55 1982
Usenet Etiquette - Please Read
The body of the article comes here, with no blank line.
An article consists of several header lines, followed by a
blank line, followed by the body of the message. The
header lines consist of a keyword, a colon, a blank, and
some additional information. This is a subset of the
ARPANET standard, simplified to allow simpler software to
handle it. The "from" line may optionally include a
full name, in the format above, or use the ARPANET angle
bracket syntax. To keep the implementations simple, other
formats (for example, with part of the machine address
after the close parenthesis) are not allowed. The ARPANET
convention of continuation header lines (beginning with a
blank or tab) is allowed.
Certain headers are required, certain headers are
optional. Any unrecognized headers are allowed, and will
be passed through unchanged. The required headers are
Relay-Version, Posting-Version, From, Date, Newsgroups,
Subject, Message-ID, Path. The optional headers are
Followup-To, Date-Received, Expires, Reply-To, Sender,
References, Control, Distribution, Organization.
