RFC 751
Survey of FTP mail and MLFL
Survey of FTP MAIL and MLFL 💅
okay bestie, this is RFC 751, a survey write-up by P. David Lebling (PDL@MIT-DMS), posted under the Network Working Group on 10 December 1978 with NIC nnnnn 🎀. The original's title block doesn't list a category or anything it obsoletes or updates, so I'm not inventing any 💀
Two surveys of Arpanet Server hosts ran between September 20, 1978 and December 11, 1978 ✨ The goal was to see how each host's Server FTP program responded to two things:
- (a) A
MAILto an unknown recipient at that host. This one had two jobs. First, to find out whether the host accepts mail for unknown recipients at all. Second, to see what response it gives if it doesn't accept that mail 📬 - (b) A
MLFLto a known recipient, instead of the usualMAILcommand 🧚 The goal was to see how widelyMLFLis supported among Server hosts, and what reply you get when a Server doesn't support it.MLFLcould honestly be a "better" way to communicate than mail, because the message goes over a data connection rather than the command connection. Using the data connection gets rid of the "end-of-mail" marker and "command reader" problems that sometimes show up on the command connection 🫶
The ground rules were that every site listed as a Server in the MIT/SAIL Host table got surveyed. A bunch of hosts listed as Servers never responded to an ICP at any point during the survey period 😭 Once a host gave what seemed to be a "definitive" answer, it got marked that way and the survey stopped there 🔥
MLFL Survey 🦋
The method was to ICP to socket 3 of the server (the standard old-FTP socket). Once a 300 response came back, the surveyor sent the MLFL command. If there was a real mailbox name at a site (a Header-person, for example), that name got used. Otherwise the name was ** 🙈 If a site asked for a password (response 504) after the MLFL command, the surveyor sent USER NETML and PASS NETML, then retried MLFL. If the server replied with a 255 SOCK command, the surveyor listened for the data connection to be established, and once it was, transferred the mail file. Interestingly enough, most sites implement an RFC queueing algorithm that lets the user site try to establish the data connection from its end 🌸
Complete FTP scripts are on MIT-DM, file NETDOC;MLFL SURVEY, if you want to dig in 🧚
Sites got grouped by the general result they gave 👑
1) Sites that lost for various reasons:
-site- -last ftp reply if lost- -when-
BNL 530 NOT LOGGED IN. after MLFL
HARV-10 431 INVALID ENTRY - Try again after USER
LLL-MFE 454 Login please after SOCK
LONDON 000 INDRA FTP Version 2.00 ... after ICP
NBS-10 454 Login please after SOCK
WHARTON 454 DATA Connection error ... after SOCK
WPAFB-AFAL 454 Login please after SOCKNote: "when" describes the last action the surveyor performed before the anomalous response 💀
after ICP -- surveyer had done ICP to socket 3
after MLFL -- surveyer had sent MLFL command
after USER -- surveyer had sent USER NETML in response to
"504 Login please"
after SOCK -- surveyer had attempted to connect to specified
data socket2) Sites that don't support MLFL and say so: 🙅♀️
AFWL 501 ML<?>FL **
CCA-SPEECH 501 ML<?>FL **
EGLIN 501 ML<?>FL **
LBL 506 Command not implemented.
LONDON-VDH 500 Command unrecognized
UCLA-CCN 500 COMMAND UNRECOGNIZED
WPAFB 501 ML<?>FL **3) Sites that support MLFL (or at least go through all the right motions): 💖
AMES-67 MIT-AI SRI-KL
BBN-TENEX MIT-DMS SU-AI
BBN-TENEXA MIT-MC SUMEX-AIM
BBN-TENEXD MIT-ML UCLA-ATS
BBN-TENEXE MIT-XX UCLA-SECURITY
BBN-UNIX NBS-UNIX USC-ECL
CCA-TENEX OFFICE-1 USC-ISI
CMU-10A PARC-MAXC USC-ISIB
CMU-10B PARC-MAXC2 USC-ISIC
DEC-MARLBORO RADC-TOPS20 USC-ISIE
I4-TENEX RAND-RCC UTEXAS
ILL-UNIX RAND-UNIX
LL RUTGERS
LL-ASG SRI-KA4) Sites that support MLFL but require "USER NETML" "PASS NETML" (Multics): 🍓
MIT-MULTICS
RADC-MULTICS5) Others: 🌈
a) Sites that might support it if the surveyor could mail to a real user. Some of these run operating systems that are "known to work", e.g. TENEX ✨
BBN-TENEXB 450 No such mailbox at this site.
CCA-SDMS 450 User Unknown
CCTC 451 User Not Recognized
CMU-10D 507 USER NOT FOUND: **
DTI 451 User Not Recognized
LL-11 450 User Unknown
LL-XN 450 User Unknown
NCSC 451 User Not Recognized
NOSC-CC 451 User Not Recognized
NOSC-SDL 451 User Not Recognized
NTIA-ITS 451 User Not Recognized
OFFICE-2 450 No such mailbox at this site.
RADC-XPER 451 User Not Recognized
SDAC-44 431 User name invalid
SDAC-UNIX 451 User Not Recognized
SRI-UNIX 451 User Not Recognizedb) Sites that either never responded to an ICP to socket 3, or weren't accepting FTP users 😭
ANL I4B-TENEX NOSC-SECURE1
ARPA-DMS ISI-SPEECH11 NSWC-WO
CMU-CMMP LBL-UNIX NUSC
CTO-DDS LLL-COMP NUSC-NPT
DTNSRDC MOFFET-ARC NWC
FNWC NADC NYU
GUNTER-UNIX NDRE PENT-UNIXMAIL Survey 📬
The MAIL survey worked a lot like the MLFL one. The command was MAIL Fzorkness, an account that's very unlikely to exist on any host 🧚 The responses fall into a few general categories ✨
Complete FTP results are on MIT-DM, file NETDOC;MAIL SURVEY 🫶
Sites by last response:
1) Sites that lost completely: 💀
LONDON 000 INDRA FTP Version <>.00 ...2) Sites that accept mail to an unknown recipient: 🔥
BNL MIT-ML USC-ISI
MIT-AI RAND-RCC USC-ISIB
MIT-DMS UCLA-CCN USC-ISIC
MIT-MC USC-ECL USC-ISIE3) Sites that refuse mail to an unknown recipient (grouped by response): 🙅♀️
SDAC-44 431 User name invalid
BBN-TENEX 450 No such mailbox at this site.
BBN-TENEXA 450 No such mailbox at this site.
BBN-TENEXB 450 No such mailbox at this site.
BBN-TENEXD 450 No such mailbox at this site.
BBN-TENEXE 450 No such mailbox at this site.
BBN-UNIX 450 User Unknown
CCA-SDMS 450 User Unknown
CCTC 451 User Unknown
EDN-UNIX 450 User Unknown
I4-TENEX 450 No such mailbox at this site.
ILL-UNIX 450 User unknown
LL 450 No such mailbox at LL
LL-ASG 450 User unknown
LL-XN 450 User unknown
MIT-MULTICS 450 Cannot locate mailbox for \Fzorkness\
MIT-XX 450 No such mailbox at this site.
NBS-UNIX 450 User Unknown
NCSC 450 User Unknown
NOSC-CC 450 User Unknown
NOSC-SDL 450 User Unknown
NTIA-ITS 450 User Unknown
OFFICE-1 450 No such mailbox at this site.
OFFICE-2 450 No such mailbox at this site.
PARC-MAXC 450 No such mailbox at this site.
PARC-MAXC2 450 No such mailbox at this site.
RADC-XPER 450 User Unknown
RADC-MULTICS 450 Cannot locate mailbox for \Fzorkness\
RADC-TOPS20 450 No such mailbox at this site.
RAND-UNIX 450 User Unknown
RUTGERS 450 No such mailbox at this site.
SDAC-UNIX 450 User Unknown
SRI-KA 450 No such mailbox at this site.
SRI-KL 450 No such mailbox at this site.
SU-AI 450 I don't know anybody named Fzorkness
SUMEX-AIM 450 No such mailbox at this site.
UCLA-ATS 450 User Unknown
UCLA-SECURITY 450 User Unknown
UTEXAS 450 User Unknown
CCA-TENEX 451 No such mailbox at this site.
AFWL 501 MA<?>IL Fzorkness
CCA-SPEECH 501 MA<?>IL Fzorkness
EGLIN 501 MA<?>IL Fzorkness
WPAFB 501 MA<?>IL Fzorkness
AMES-67 503 COMMAND \MAIL FZORKNESS\ IGNORED: UNKNOWN USER
LBL 506 Command not implemented.
CMU-10A 507 % USER NOT FOUND: FZORKNESS
CMU-10B 507 % USER NOT FOUND: FZORKNESS
CMU-10D 507 % USER NOT FOUND: FZORKNESS
HARV-10 507 No such user as FZORKNESS
LLL-MFE 507 No such user as FZORKNESS
NBS-10 507 No such user as FZORKNESS
WHARTON 507 No such user as FZORKN
WPAFB-AFAL 507 No such user as FZORKNESS4) Sites I was never able to connect to, or that weren't accepting users: 😭
ANL I4B-TENEX NOSC-SECURE1
ARPA-DMS ISI-SPEECH11 NSWC-WO
CMU-CMMP LBL-UNIX NUSC
CTO-DDS LL-11 NUSC-NPT
DEC-MARLBORO LLL-COMP NWC
DTI LONDON-VDH NYU
DTNSRDC MOFFETT-ARC SRI-UNIX
FNWC NADC SU-ISL
GUNTER-UNIX NDREthat's the whole tea, bestie 🌈💅✨
📦 where this page comes from
- ietf: rfc751 1978-12
- 💖 girlified by claude-haiku-5-5 on : a language model's rewrite of the original, under its terms