Bug 296629 - kmail2 uses quoted-printable encoded composite mime parts, violating RFC2045
Summary: kmail2 uses quoted-printable encoded composite mime parts, violating RFC2045
Status: RESOLVED FIXED
Alias: None
Product: kmail2
Classification: Applications
Component: composer (show other bugs)
Version: 4.14.2
Platform: Ubuntu Linux
: NOR normal
Target Milestone: ---
Assignee: kdepim bugs
URL:
Keywords:
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2012-03-23 15:07 UTC by Dennis Schridde
Modified: 2017-06-28 16:50 UTC (History)
6 users (show)

See Also:
Latest Commit:
Version Fixed In:
Sentry Crash Report:


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Description Dennis Schridde 2012-03-23 15:07:17 UTC
listserv.fnal.gov replies to my messages sent with kmail-4.8.1:
---
Your message contains a QUOTED-PRINTABLE encoded composite MIME part, which is not allowed by Internet standards (see  RFC2045, section 6.4, paragraph 5). In plain English, an error in your mail program, or in a firewall or mail gateway between your computer and LISTSERV, has caused  an error in the format of your message.
---

It refers to this paragraph:
---
   Certain Content-Transfer-Encoding values may only be used on certain
   media types.  In particular, it is EXPRESSLY FORBIDDEN to use any
   encodings other than "7bit", "8bit", or "binary" with any composite
   media type, i.e. one that recursively includes other Content-Type
   fields.  Currently the only composite media types are "multipart" and
   "message".  All encodings that are desired for bodies of type
   multipart or message must be done at the innermost level, by encoding
   the actual body that needs to be encoded.
---

The quoted message listserv attached shows that kmail did indeed violate this:
---
Content-Type: multipart/signed; boundary="..."; micalg="pgp-sha1"; protocol="application/pgp-signature"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
---

This is the same as Akonadi saved in my sent folder, so I can exclude a bug in a mail gateway.

The issue did not happen with kmail-4.8.0 or 4.7.4.
Comment 1 Tarpast 2012-05-23 17:59:29 UTC
I confirm this bug. Kmail2 has problem with quoted printable charakter encodings in incoming mails. Mostly from Gmail, but not usually. Problem with czech (central european) charakters. I attached part of message.
...........
--047d7b33d6e051cffd04c0b3560b
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-2"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

Ahoj,

m=E9 jm=E9no je Johana Schov=E1nkov=E1 a p=ED=B9u Ti za skautsk=FD odbor Sk=
auting pro
v=B9echny. Mailov=FD kontakt na Tebe jsme z=EDskali z datab=E1ze SkautISu, =
.............
Comment 2 Thomas Arend 2012-08-30 18:05:50 UTC
I can confirm the bug for 4.9 

This bug may cause trouble for other mail client. It seems that Outlook and Lotus Notes have cant interpret / display kmail generated messages with a "Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable" in the message header.

To change this should not be a to big task.

Thomas
Comment 3 Myriam Schweingruber 2012-09-02 07:01:29 UTC
Setting status to confirmed.
Comment 4 csbugs 2012-12-11 19:55:34 UTC
(In reply to comment #2)
> I can confirm the bug for 4.9 
> 
> This bug may cause trouble for other mail client. It seems that Outlook and
> Lotus Notes have cant interpret / display kmail generated messages with a
> "Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable" in the message header.

I can add that this bug holds recent Thunderbird versions with Enigmail (TB 17, enigmail 1.4.6) off from decrypting OpenPGP/MIME encrypted emails sent by kmail2.
Comment 5 quazgar 2013-03-26 22:54:39 UTC
(In reply to comment #4)
> I can add that this bug holds recent Thunderbird versions with Enigmail (TB
> 17, enigmail 1.4.6) off from decrypting OpenPGP/MIME encrypted emails sent
> by kmail2.

More specifically, here is the bug report at Enigmail:
https://sourceforge.net/p/enigmail/bugs/77/
Comment 6 quazgar 2013-03-27 11:51:45 UTC
(In reply to comment #1)
> I confirm this bug. Kmail2 has problem with quoted printable charakter
> encodings in incoming mails. Mostly from Gmail, but not usually. Problem
> with czech (central european) charakters. I attached part of message.
> ...........
> --047d7b33d6e051cffd04c0b3560b
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-2"
> Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
> 
> Ahoj,
> 
> m=E9 jm=E9no je Johana Schov=E1nkov=E1 a p=ED=B9u Ti za skautsk=FD odbor Sk=
> auting pro
> v=B9echny. Mailov=FD kontakt na Tebe jsme z=EDskali z datab=E1ze SkautISu, =
> .............

Hello Tarpast,

could it be that the behaviour you describe is a different bug? It seems to refer to displaying and not the sending of messages.
Comment 7 Tarpast 2013-03-28 00:12:38 UTC
Hello Daniel,
yes, you have right. It was my quickly reaction.
Now, I am using Kmail 4.9.5 and this bug appear rarely - come 2 identical 
messages, first OK, second with broken encoding.

regards Michael (Tarpast)



---------- Původní zpráva ----------
Od: Daniel Hornung <daniel.hornung@gmx.de>
Datum: 27. 3. 2013
Předmět: [kmail2] [Bug 296629] kmail2 uses quoted-printable encoded 
composite mime parts, violating RFC2045

"https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=296629

--- Comment #6 from Daniel Hornung <daniel.hornung@gmx.de> ---
(In reply to comment #1)
> I confirm this bug. Kmail2 has problem with quoted printable charakter
> encodings in incoming mails. Mostly from Gmail, but not usually. Problem
> with czech (central european) charakters. I attached part of message.
> ...........
> --047d7b33d6e051cffd04c0b3560b
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-2"
> Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable
> 
> Ahoj,
> 
> m=E9 jm=E9no je Johana Schov=E1nkov=E1 a p=ED=B9u Ti za skautsk=FD odbor 
Sk=
> auting pro
> v=B9echny. Mailov=FD kontakt na Tebe jsme z=EDskali z datab=E1ze SkautISu,
=
> .............

Hello Tarpast,

could it be that the behaviour you describe is a different bug? It seems to
refer to displaying and not the sending of messages.
Comment 8 quazgar 2013-03-28 06:36:57 UTC
(In reply to comment #7)

So your problem is the one described in bug #292767?  Then this bug probably can be closed as soon as the sending problem is fixed.
Comment 9 Sandro Knauß 2013-03-28 09:01:25 UTC

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of bug 289722 ***
Comment 10 Dennis Schridde 2015-01-29 18:52:34 UTC
I am using KMail 4.14.2 on Ubuntu 14.04 and am still experience this issue. Please reopen.

Listserv replies:
"""
Your message contains a QUOTED-PRINTABLE encoded composite MIME part, which is
not allowed by Internet standards (see RFC2045, section 6.4, paragraph 5). In
plain English, an error in your mail program, or in a firewall or mail gateway
between your computer and LISTSERV, has caused an error in the format of your
message.
"""

Excerpt from the message returned by listserv:
"""
[…]
User-Agent: KMail/4.14.2 (Linux/3.13.0-44-generic; KDE/4.14.2; x86_64; ; )
[…]
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: multipart/signed; boundary="nextPart1643101.pK0q01Qtpq"; micalg="pgp-sha1"; protocol="application/pgp-signature"


--nextPart1643101.pK0q01Qtpq
Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="nextPart1991752.9pWY7iA1iV"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable

This is a multi-part message in MIME format.
[…]
"""

This message also has two 500KiB PDF attachments:
"""
=2D-nextPart2164026.fLyKns4tNR
Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="[…].pdf"
Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64
Content-Type: application/pdf; name="[…].pdf"
"""
Comment 11 Denis Kurz 2017-06-23 20:03:16 UTC
This bug has never been confirmed for a KDE PIM version that is based on KDE Frameworks (5.x). Those versions differ significantly from the old 4.x series. Therefore, I plan to close it in around two or three months. In the meantime, it is set to WAITINGFORINFO to give reporters the oportunity to check if it is still valid. As soon as someone confirms it for a recent version (at least 5.1, ideally even more recent), I'll gladly reopen it.

Please understand that we lack the manpower to triage bugs reported for versions almost two years beyond their end of life.
Comment 12 Dennis Schridde 2017-06-28 08:35:37 UTC
KMail 5.5.1 does not specify any Content-Transfer-Encoding at all anymore:
```
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: multipart/signed; boundary="..."; micalg="pgp-sha256"; protocol="application/pgp-signature"
```

I.e. it defaults to 7bit encoding: `"Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7BIT" is assumed if the Content-Transfer-Encoding header field is not present.` (RFC 2045, Section 6.1, https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc2045#section-6.1)

Thus this bug can be considered RESOLVED/FIXED.