RFC Errata
RFC 5322, "Internet Message Format", October 2008
Note: This RFC has been updated by RFC 6854
Source of RFC: IETF - NON WORKING GROUPArea Assignment: app
Errata ID: 8464
Status: Rejected
Type: Technical
Publication Format(s) : TEXT
Reported By: Mason K
Date Reported: 2025-06-17
Rejected by: Andy Newton
Date Rejected: 2025-11-01
Section 4.4 says:
obs-angle-addr = [CFWS] "<" obs-route addr-spec ">" [CFWS]
It should say:
obs-angle-addr = [CFWS] "<" [obs-route] addr-spec ">" [CFWS]
Notes:
If I understand correctly, according to RFC 822 (the RFC 5322 'obsolete syntax'), an email address enclosed in angle brackets may or may not have a prepended route. If correct, the obs-route particle of the ABNF declaration should be labeled optional in brackets [].
RFC 5322 states that
"mailbox addresses were allowed to have a route portion before the addr-spec when enclosed in "<" and ">"", which suggests that they were also allowed to not have a route portion.
RFC 822 Section 6.1 defines the route is optional in an angle bracketed address:
route-addr = "<" [route] addr-spec ">"
and RFC 2822 Section 4.4, where the section in question seems to be copied from, does indeed label the route portion as optional in the ABNF:
obs-angle-addr = [CFWS] "<" [obs-route] addr-spec ">" [CFWS]
--VERIFIER NOTES--
From Pete Resnick:
This is a bit obscure, but the current text is correct. The only place
that obs-angle-addr is used in the syntax is section 3.4:
angle-addr = [CFWS] "<" addr-spec ">" [CFWS] /
obs-angle-addr
If you do the substitution, you get:
angle-addr = [CFWS] "<" addr-spec ">" [CFWS] /
[CFWS] "<" obs-route addr-spec ">" [CFWS]
What that says is that angle-addr is either without a route, or with an
obs-route. Making the obs-route in there as optional would be redundant.
We could have made angle-addr this way:
angle-addr = [CFWS] "<" [obs-route] addr-spec ">" [CFWS]
but that breaks the pattern of having an obs- replacement as a final
alternative, and I think it would probably be more confusing.