8 ms·
nope, exactly this feature you describe is what i am referring to. it's not a gmail invention. not by a long shot.
by em-bee 2y ago
nope, exactly this feature you describe is what i am referring to. it's not a gmail invention. not by a long shot.
- MatekCopatek 2y agoTIL! Thanks, was not aware of that.
- wiml 2y agoI think it originated with CMU's email system (the use of the "+" sign specifically).
- technothrasher 2y agoYou're right. Originally the + sign in an email address was an indicator to the Andrew Message System's delivery agent to process the email in an extensible way. The syntax was +<keyword>+<args>. As an example. you could use "user+dir-insert+misc" to route the message to the "misc" directory in the user's mailbox structure. An unknown keyword would just get ignored and the mail delivered as usual, giving the behavior as used today.
- sethammons 2y agoNot a gmail invention perhaps, but also not per RFC. That some use it to mean something special is not in the RFC. Actually, a significant number of SMTP servers don't even implement the required parts of the related RFCs, let alone fancy things like plus handling.
- Sami_Lehtinen 2y agoAgreed, most of email servers and services are broken per RFC. I've blogged about this over and over again.
- em-bee 2y agoit is not in the SMTP RFC because it is a purely local matter that does not affect email routing. there are a number of servers that support it. wikipedia lists some if them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Email_address#Sub-addressing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Email_address#Sub-addressing