705587 - For malformed message with multiple headers of same type (but RFC 5322 max-number=1), TB should only use the first header instance consistently (show/use only the first From:, To:, Date: etc. in message list, message reader, replies, filtering etc.)

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 310189

(MailNews Core :: MIME, defect)

Description

[Neal Poole]

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; rv:8.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/8.0
Build ID: 20111104165243

Steps to reproduce:

I sent an email using the following PHP script and then checked my email in Thunderbird

<?php
mail('[e-mail]', 'Test Email', 'Test Message', "From: [e-mail]\nFrom:[e-mail]");


Actual results:

The UI displayed the From: header inconsistently. The list of messages displayed the sender as [e-mail], but viewing the actual message listed the sender as [e-mail].


Expected results:

The From value should have been consistent between the two views.

Comment 1

[Neal Poole]

Attachment: A screenshot of the issue, taken in an older version of Thunderbird

Comment 2

[Neal Poole]

I filed this separately from bug 310189 at the request of WADA.

Comment 3

[WADA:World Anti-bad-Duping Agency]

Following is headers defined as "Max number=1" in RFC 5322.
> http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5322#section-3.6
>    +----------------+--------+------------+
>    | Field          | Min    | Max number |
>    |                | number |            |
>    +----------------+--------+------------+
>    | orig-date      | 1      | 1          |
>    | from           | 1      | 1          |
>    | sender         | 0*     | 1          |
>    | reply-to       | 0      | 1          |
>    | to             | 0      | 1          |
>    | cc             | 0      | 1          |
>    | bcc            | 0      | 1          |
>    | message-id     | 0*     | 1          |
>    | in-reply-to    | 0*     | 1          |
>    | references     | 0*     | 1          |
>    | subject        | 0      | 1          |
>    +----------------+--------+------------+

If Max number=1, "multiple headers" means malformed mail, and first header should be used for thread pane display & message pane display(this bug), and in message filtering & search too(bug 310189). This should be consistent among headers defined as "Max number=1".

bug 172104 fixed problem on multiple Subject: only. So this bug is followup bug of bug 172104.

Comment 4

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

Confirming for 88.0a1 (2021-03-17) (64-bit).
We have inconsistent handling of malformed messages with multiple headers of same type (To, From, Date etc.) in spite of max-number=1.
Particularly, what we show in message header vs. message list is different, which is quite confusing.

Comment 5

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

Attachment: Testcase-1.eml: Multiple headers of same type, only the first should be parsed (if RFC 5322 max-number=1)

Here's a minimal testcase which has duplicate headers for virtually everything.

Comment 6

[Thomas D. (:thomas8)]

Attachment: Screenshot 1: Testcase 1 showing different headers in message list vs. message reader, and sometimes showing second headers (To, Cc, but not Bcc)

Screenshot shows Testcase 1 with duplicate headers in source (relevant message list columns shown are subject, correspondents, and date).

• inconsistent headers in message list vs message reader
• inconsistent in msg reader: To/CC (wrongly showing both instances) vs. Bcc (showing first instance only)
• Reply confusion: Attribution line uses second headers for XX wrote and the date
• Reply wrongly includes 2nd instances of original From/To as reply recipients
• Reply-all skips the CC recipients of the original message (should use first instance of original CC)

For developers' convenience, here's the details...
Only checkmarks ✔ and n/a are correct behaviour afasics.

Header	Message list	Message reader	Replies	Reply-All
From:	1st From ✔	2nd From	Reply goes to 1st & 2nd From, vs. "2nd From wrote: ..."	Replies goes to 1st & 2nd From vs. "2nd From wrote ..."
Subject:	1st Subject ✔	1st Subject ✔	1st Subject ✔	1st Subject ✔
Date:	1st Date	2nd Date	2nd Date	"... wrote on 2nd Date"
To:	1st & 2nd To	1st & 2nd To	n/a	Reply recipients include: 1st & 2nd To
Cc:	1st & 2nd Cc	not shown in msg list (bugs)	n/a	missing (reply-all fails to include any one of the original Cc recipients)
Bcc:	1st Bcc	not shown in msg list (bugs)	n/a	n/a (by design no reply to original bcc, to prevent accidental exposure)

(Table done with Typora, thanks to Ryan for recommending that!)

(In reply to Thomas D. (:thomas8) from comment #4)

Confirming for 88.0a1 (2021-03-17) (64-bit).
We have inconsistent handling of malformed messages with multiple headers of same type (To, From, Date etc.) in spite of max-number=1.
Particularly, what we show in message header vs. message list is different, which is quite confusing.

Comment 7

[Magnus Melin [:mkmelin]]

This is the same as bug 310189.