ietf-nntp Response code issues

[Jeffrey M. Vinocur]

On Fri, 4 Apr 2003, Russ Allbery wrote:

> Clive D W Feather <clive at demon.net> writes:
> 
> > Other possibilities:
> > * Merge AUTH and TLS into the base specification, so that they are special
> > cases that are allowed generic responses.

Too many problems with this to consider, I think.

 
> > * Provide some mechanism for a server to say "I return the following
> > codes for 'you're in the wrong state and need to invoke this
> > extension'".

This is a curious idea that I passed over last week without giving it fair 
consideration.  Some sort of extensible response code mechanism just could 
work.  I can imagine a couple different ways to implement this, none that 
seems perfect offhand, and a lot of work for a less-than-overwhelming 
benefit, but possible.


> Personally, I'm leaning towards just documenting 480 as a generic response
> code for insufficient authentication or transport security, with a second
> choice of documenting 480 and 483 as generic response codes, and
> everything else seems less good.

I don't suppose we have any consensus on this, such that I can move 
forward with a new version of the TLS draft...


-- 
Jeffrey M. Vinocur
jeff at litech.org