RFC1486: An Experiment in Remote Printing
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Network Working Group M. Rose
Request for Comments: 1486 Dover Beach Consulting, Inc.
C. Malamud
Internet Multicasting Service
July 1993
An Experiment in Remote Printing
Status of this Memo
This memo defines an Experimental Protocol for the Internet
community. It does not specify an Internet standard. Discussion and
suggestions for improvement are requested. Please refer to the
current edition of the "IAB Official Protocol Standards" for the
standardization state and status of this protocol. Distribution of
this memo is unlimited.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction .......................................... 1
1.1 The Advantage of a General-Purpose Infrastructure..... 2
2. Procedure ............................................. 2
2.1 Naming, Addressing, and Routing ...................... 3
2.2 The application/remote-printing Content-Type ......... 4
2.3 Usage Example ........................................ 5
2.4 Remote Printing without MIME ......................... 6
3. The Experiment ........................................ 7
3.1 Infrastructure ....................................... 8
3.1.1 Zones .............................................. 8
3.1.2 MX records ......................................... 8
3.2 Accounting and Privacy ............................... 9
3.3 Mailing list ......................................... 9
3.4 Prototype Implementation ............................. 10
4. Future Issues ......................................... 11
5. Security Considerations ............................... 11
6. Acknowledgements ...................................... 11
7. References ............................................ 11
8. Authors' Addresses..................................... 12
A. The image/tiff Content-Type .......................... 13
B. Uniform Addressing ................................... 13
1. Introduction
Although electronic mail is preferable as a means of third-party
communication, in some cases it may be necessary to print
information, in hard-copy form, at a remote location. The remote
output device may consist of a standard line printer, a printer with
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RFC 1486 An Experiment in Remote Printing July 1993
multiple fonts and faces, a printer that can reproduce graphics, or a
facsimile device. Remote output may be accompanied by information
that identifies the intended recipient. This memo describes a
technique for "remote printing" using the Internet mail
infrastructure. In particular, this memo focuses on the case in
which remote printers are connected to the international telephone
network. Furthermore, it describes an experiment in remote printing.
1.1. The Advantage of a General-Purpose Infrastructure
The experiment in remote printing is about "outreach"; specifically,
integrating the e-mail and facsimile communities. By providing easy
access to remote printing recipients, enterprise-wide access is
enhanced, regardless of kind of institution (e.g., commercial,
educational, or government), or the size of institution (e.g.,
global, regional, or local). This approach at outreach allows an
organization to make it easier for the "outside world" to communicate
with the personnel in the organization who are users of facsimile but
not e-mail; e.g., the sales person, the university registrar, or the
(elected) official. The ease in which the Internet mail
infrastructure can be used to provide this facility is (yet) another
example of the power of a general-purpose infrastructure.
2. Procedure
When information is to be remotely printed, the user application
constructs an RFC 822 [1] message, containing a "Message-ID" field
along with a "multipart/mixed" content [2] having two parts, the
first being a "application/remote-printing" content-type, and the
second being an arbitrary content-type corresponding to the
information to be printed. The message is then sent to the remote
printer server's electronic mail address.
It should be noted that not all content-types have a natural printing
representation, e.g., an "audio" or "video" content. For this
reason, the second part of the "multipart/mixed" content should be
one of the following:
text/plain, message/rfc822, application/postscript image/tiff
(defined in Appendix A), any multipart
Note that:
(1) With the "text/plain" content-type, not all character sets may
be available for printing.
(2) With the "message" content-type, the subordinate content will be
processed recursively.
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(3) With the "application/postscript" content-type, the remote
printer server should evaluate the contents in a safe execution
environment.
(4) With the "multipart" content-type the subordinate contents will
be processed recursively: for a "multipart/mixed" or
"multipart/digest" content, each subordinate content will start
on a new page, whilst for a "multipart/parallel" content, all
subordinate contents will, if possible, start on the same page.
Naturally, when processing a "multipart/alternative" content,
only one subordinate content will be printed.
When the remote printer server finishes its processing, a message is
returned to the originator, indicating either success or failure.
2.1. Naming, Addressing, and Routing
A printer is identified by a telephone number which corresponds to a
G3-facsimile device connected to the international telephone network,
e.g.,
+1 415 968 2510
where "+1" indicates the IDDD country code, and the remaining string
is a telephone number within that country. This number is used to
construct the address of a remote printer server, which forms the
recipient address for the message, e.g.,
remote-printer@0.1.5.2.8.6.9.5.1.4.1.tpc.int
That is, the local-part of the remote printer server's address is
ALWAYS "remote-printer", and the domain-part is constructed by
reversing the telephone number, converting each digit to a domain-
label, and being placed under "tpc.int."
The message is routed in exactly the same fashion as all other
electronic mail, i.e., using the MX algorithm [3]. Since a remote
printer server might be able to access many printers, the wildcarding
facilities of the DNS [4,5] are used accordingly. For example, if a
remote printer server residing at "dbc.mtview.ca.us" was willing to
access any printer with a telephone number prefix of
+1 415 968
then this resource record might be present
*.8.6.9.5.1.4.1.tpc.int. IN MX 10 dbc.mtview.ca.us.
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Naturally, if several remote printer servers were willing to access
any printer in that prefix, multiple MX resource records would be
present.
It should be noted that the presence of a wildcard RR which matches a
remote printer server's address does not imply that the corresponding
telephone number is valid, or, if valid, that a G3-facsimile device
is connected at the phone number.
2.2. The application/remote-printing Content-Type
(1) MIME type name: application
(2) MIME subtype name: remote-printing
(3) Required parameters: none
(4) Optional parameters: none
(5) Encoding considerations: 7bit preferred
(6) Security considerations: none
The "application/remote-printing" content-type contains originator
and recipient information used when generating a cover sheet. Using
the ABNF notation of RFC 822, the syntax for this content is:
<content> ::= <recipient-info> CRLF
<originator-info>
[CRLF <cover-info>]
<recipient-info> ::= "Recipient" ":" <value> CRLF
<address-info>
<originator-info> ::= "Originator" ":" <value> CRLF
<address-info>
<address-info> ::= ["Title" ":" <value> CRLF]
["Department" ":" <value> CRLF]
["Organization" ":" <value> CRLF]
["Mailstop" ":" <value> CRLF]
["Address" ":" <value> CRLF]
["Telephone" ":" <value> CRLF]
"Facsimile" ":" <value> CRLF
["Email" ":" <value> CRLF]
<value> ::= *text
[CRLF LWSP-char <value> ]
<cover-info> ::= *(*text CRLF)
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Note that the value of the "Email" field is an RFC 822 mailbox
address.
2.3. Usage Example
Suppose someone wished to send the author some comments on this memo
using this facility. The message constructed might look like this:
To: remote-printer@0.1.5.2.8.6.9.5.1.4.1.tpc.int
From: "John Q. Public" <jpublic@tpd.org>
Date: Sun, 11 Apr 1993 20:34:13 -0800
Subject: Comments on "An Experiment in Remote Printing"
Message-ID: <19930411203413000.456@tpd.org>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: multipart/mixed;
boundary="----- =_aaaaaaaaaa0"
------- =_aaaaaaaaaa0
Content-Type: application/remote-printing
Recipient: Marshall Rose
Title: Principal
Organization: Dover Beach Consulting, Inc.
Address: 420 Whisman Court
Mountain View, CA 94043-2186
US
Telephone: +1 415 968 1052
Facsimile: +1 415 968 2510
Originator: John Q. Public
Organization: The Public Domain
Telephone: +1 801 555 1234
Facsimile: +1 801 555 6789
EMail: "John Q. Public" <jpublic@tpd.org>
Any text appearing here would go on the cover-sheet.
------- =_aaaaaaaaaa0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Here are my comments on your draft.
...
------- =_aaaaaaaaaa0--
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2.4. Remote Printing without MIME
If the originator's user agent doesn't support MIME, (e.g., the
originator accesses the Internet mail infrastructure via a gateway in
another mail dominion), then it is still possible for remote printing
to occur, albeit in a more limited fashion. Specifically, because a
"application/remote-printing" content is not present, cover sheet
information must be derived from some other source; and, the message
body will be treated as a "text/plain" content.
Typically, a cover sheet consists of three sections:
o information identifying the originator;
o information identifying the recipient; and,
o additional information supplied by the remote printer server.
To identify the originator, the remote printer server will use the
message headers, usually by stripping any trace headers (i.e.,
"Received" and "Return-Path") and then re-ordering the remaining
headers starting with the "From" header.
To identify the recipient, an alternative syntax is used for
recipient addressing, in which the local-part of the remote printer
server's address consists of "remote-printer" followed by an RFC 822
atom, e.g.,
remote-printer.Arlington_Hewes/Room_403@0.1.5.2.8.6.9.5.1.4.1.tpc.int
This mailbox syntax is purposefully restricted in the interests of
pragmatism.
The atom following "remote-printer" is considered an opaque string
for use in recipient identification when generating a cover sheet.
To paraphrase RFC 822, an atom is defined as:
atom = 1*atomchar
atomchar= <any upper or lowercase alphabetic character (A-Z a-z)>
/ <any digit (0-9)>
/ "!" / "#" / "$" / "%" / "&" / "'" / "*" / "+"
/ "-" / "/" / "=" / "?" / "^" / "_" / "`" / "{"
/ "|" / "}" / "~"
When generating a cover sheet using this opaque string, the remote
printer server will interpret an underscore character ("_") as a
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RFC 1486 An Experiment in Remote Printing July 1993
space, and a solidus character ("/") as an end-of-line sequence. A
remote printer server will interpret two consecutive underscore
characters in the opaque string as a single underscore, and two
consecutive solidus characters as a single solidus. So, the opaque
string,
Arlington_Hewes/Room_403
used in the example above might appear on the cover sheet as
To: Arlington Hewes
Room 403
Note that some Internet mail software (especially gateways from
outside the Internet) impose stringent limitations on the size of a
mailbox-string. Thus, originating user agents should take care in
limiting the local-part to no more than 70 or so characters.
Note that by using the alternative syntax for recipient addressing,
it is completely legal to send non- textual messages in which the
cover sheet information is automatically derived -- simply by
including "MIME-Version:" and "Content-Type:" headers in the message,
but omitting the initial "application/remote-printing" content, e.g.,
To: remote-printer.Arlington_Hewes/Room_403@0.1.5.2.8.6.9.5.1.4.1.tpc.int
cc: Marshall Rose <mrose@dbc.mtview.ca.us>
From: Carl Malamud <carl@malamud.com>
Date: Sun, 18 Jul 1993 09:14:13 -0500
Subject: proposal for enhancement
Message-ID: <19930718141413000.123@malamud.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: application/postcript
%!
Note that by using the alternative syntax for recipient addressing,
remote printing and e-mail recipients can be identified in the same
message.
3. The Experiment
In order to gain experience with this style of remote printing, an
experiment is underway.
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3.1. Infrastructure
The domain "tpc.int." is being populated in order to provide the MX-
based infrastructure for routing to a remote printer server. In
order to facilitate distributed operations, this domain is divided
into a zone for each IDDD country code. Sites participating in the
experiment contact the appropriate zone administrator in order to be
listed, by examining the SOA resource record associated with the
zone. For example, a site in the Netherlands (IDDD country code 31)
would contact the zone administrator for the domain "1.3.tpc.int." in
order to be listed, e.g.,
% dig 1.3.tpc.int. soa
Each zone administrator has a simple set of procedures for listing a
participant. For example, in the US (IDDD country code 1),
participating sites send an "exchange file" to the administrator,
which indicates the prefixes that the site wishes to list. The zone
administrator for the domain "1.tpc.int." merges the exchange files
from all participating sites to create a zone for each area code.
These zones are then replicated using the normal DNS zone transfer
procedures.
3.1.1. Zones
It should be noted that zones under "tpc.int" are created on the
basis of IDDD country codes and area codes; they are not created for
each subdomain. For example, in the US and Canada (IDDD country code
1), no more than one zone is allocated for each area code. In
contrast, for countries with a smaller numbering plan, only a single
zone, for the whole country would be allocated. For example, if Fiji
(IDDD country code 679), were to join the experiment, then it is
likely that a single zone would be added to the DNS, i.e.,
"9.7.6.tpc.int."
3.1.2. MX records
The MX records present in a zone can have an arbitrary level of
precision. For example, the North American Numbering Plan (IDDD
country code 1) is structured by a 3-digit area code, followed by a
3-digit exchange prefix, followed by a 4-digit station number. As
such, one might expect that MX records in this zone would be similar
to
*.5.1.4.1.tpc.int. IN MX 10 dbc.mtview.ca.us.
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RFC 1486 An Experiment in Remote Printing July 1993
which accessed any printer with a telephone number prefix of
+1 415
(i.e., allowing access to any printer in area code 415), or might be
similar to
*.8.6.9.5.1.4.1.tpc.int. IN MX 10 dbc.mtview.ca.us.
(i.e., allowing access to any printer in area code 415, exchange
prefix 968).
However, the level of precision is arbitrary. For example, if all of
the printers in an organization had a telephone number prefix of
+1 415 96
then an MX record such as
*.6.9.5.1.4.1.tpc.int. IN MX 10 dbc.mtview.ca.us.
could be used.
3.2. Accounting and Privacy
There is no accounting nor settlement in the experiment; however,
participating sites may implement access control to prevent abuse.
Records may be kept for auditing purposes; however, the privacy of a
participant's printing should be honored. As such, any auditing
should contain at most this information:
o the date the message was received;
o the "From" and "Message-ID" fields;
o the size of the body;
o the identity (telephone number) of the printer;
o any telephony-related information, such as call duration;
and,
o any G3-related information, such recipient ID.
3.3. Mailing list
There is a mailing list for the experiment. Interested readers
should send a note to:
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RFC 1486 An Experiment in Remote Printing July 1993
tpc-rp-request@aarnet.edu.au
and ask to subscribe to the
tpc-rp@aarnet.edu.au
list.
3.4. Prototype Implementation
A prototype implementation is openly available. The MIME
instructions for retrieval are:
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: multipart/alternative;
boundary="----- =_aaaaaaaaaa0"
Content-Description: pointers to ftp and e-mail access
------- =_aaaaaaaaaa0
Content-Type: message/external-body;
access-type="mail-server";
server="archive-server@ftp.ics.uci.edu"
Content-Type: application/octet-stream; type="tar";
x-conversions="x-compress"
Content-ID: <4599.735726126.1@dbc.mtview.ca.us>
mimesend mrose/tpc/rp.tar.Z
------- =_aaaaaaaaaa0
Content-Type: message/external-body;
access-type="anon-ftp"; name="rp.tar.Z";
directory="mrose/tpc"; site="ftp.ics.uci.edu"
Content-Type: application/octet-stream; type="tar";
x-conversions="x-compress"
Content-ID: <4599.735726126.2@dbc.mtview.ca.us>
------- =_aaaaaaaaaa0--
This package contains software for UNIX-based systems, and was
developed and tested under SunOS, with an openly-available facsimile
package (Sam Leffler's FlexFAX package), and contains information for
sites acting as either client or server participants, and zone
administrators.
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4. Future Issues
The experiment in remote printing described herein does not address
several issues, e.g.,
o determining which content-types and character sets are
supported by a remote printer server;
o introduction of authentication, integrity, privacy,
authorization, and accounting services;
o preferential selection of a remote printer server; and,
o aggregation of multiple print recipients in a single
message.
Initially, the experiment will not address these issues. However,
subsequent work might consider these issues in detail.
5. Security Considerations
Internet mail may be subject to monitoring by third parties, and in
particular, message relays.
6. Acknowledgements
Carl Malamud of the Internet Multicasting Service provided
substantive comments on the design of the experiment. Douglas Comer
of Purdue, Daniel Karrenberg of RIPE, Sam Leffler of SGI, Paul
Mockapetris of ARPA, also provided comments.
7. References
[1] Crocker, D., "Standard for the Format of ARPA Internet Text
Messages", STD 11, RFC 822, UDEL, August, 1982.
[2] Borenstein, N., and N. Freed, "MIME: Mechanisms for Specifying
and Describing the Format of Internet Message Bodies", RFC 1341,
Bellcore, Innosoft, June 1992.
[3] Partridge, C., "Mail Routing and the Domain System", RFC 974,
CSNET CIC BBN, August 1982.
[4] Mockapetris, P., "Domain Names -- Concepts and Facilities", STD
13, RFC 1034, USC/Information Sciences Institute, November 1987.
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[5] Mockapetris, P., "Domain Names -- Implementation and
Specification", STD 13, RFC 1035, USC/Information Sciences
Institute, November 1987.
8. Authors' Addresses
Marshall T. Rose
Dover Beach Consulting, Inc.
420 Whisman Court
Mountain View, CA 94043-2186
US
Phone: +1 415 968 1052
Fax: +1 415 968 2510
EMail: mrose@dbc.mtview.ca.us
Carl Malamud
Internet Multicasting Service
Suite 1155, The National Press Building
Washington, DC 20045
US
Phone: +1 202 628-2044
Fax: +1 202 628 2042
EMail: carl@malamud.com
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Appendix A. The image/tiff Content-Type
(1) MIME type name: image
(2) MIME subtype name: tiff
(3) Required parameters: none
(4) Optional parameters: none
(5) Encoding considerations: base64
(6) Security considerations: none
(7) Published specification: TIFF class F, as defined in:
Tag Image File Format (TIFF) revision 6.0
Developer's Desk Aldus Corporation 411 First Ave. South Suite
200 Seattle, WA 98104 206-622-5500
Appendix B. Uniform Addressing
A user may choose to include several recipients in a message, one or
more of which may be recipients reached via remote printing.
However, the message format accepted by a remote printer server
contains only a single recipient.
There are three solutions to this problem: first, during composition,
a "smart" user agent can determine that one or more remote printing
recipients are present, and submit the appropriate messages. This
has the disadvantage that the submission for the e-mail recipients
does not contain any information about the remote-printing
recipients.
A second solution is to use the alternative syntax for recipient
addressing described in Section 2.4 -- however, this minimizes useful
information available when constructing the cover sheet.
A third solution is for a site participating as a client to offer a
remote printing recipient exploder server to its users. Each remote
printing recipient is assigned a mailbox relative to the exploder,
and, as such, appears as an "ordinary" e-mail address. Using this
strategy, the user agent has no knowledge of which recipients are
accessible via e-mail or remote-printing -- the user simply specifies
a collection of mailbox recipients. Those recipients which are
accessible via remote-printing are automatically routed to the
exploder. For each recipient in the envelope, a local database is
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consulted to retrieve addressing information for the recipient, and a
message is submitted to the appropriate remote printer server.
For example, if the original message submitted was:
To: mrose@rpexplode.tpd.org
cc: Arlington Hewes <tpcadmin@dbc.mtview.ca.us>
From: "John Q. Public" <jpublic@tpd.org>
Date: Sun, 11 Apr 1993 20:34:12 -0800
Subject: Comments on "An Experiment in Remote Printing"
Message-ID: <19930411203412000.123@tpd.org>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Here are my comments on your draft.
...
then the first recipient, "mrose@rpexplode.tpd.org", would be routed
to an remote printing exploder, which would submit the message shown
in the example in Section 2.3. The second recipient,
"tpcadmin@dbc.mtview.ca.us", would receive the message shown here.
Note that a reply by this recipient could include the remote printing
recipient.
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