Network Working Group                                    Greg Vaudreuil
Internet Draft                                      Lucent Technologies
Document: <draft-ietf-vpim-vpimv2r2-dur-00.txt>           Glenn Parsons
Obsoletes: RFC 2424                                     Nortel Networks
Category: Standards Track                             November 16, 2000


                            Content Duration
                         MIME Header Definition



Status of this Memo

   This document is an Internet-Draft and is in full conformance with
   all provisions of Section 10 of RFC2026.

   Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
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1. Abstract

   This document describes the MIME header Content-Duration that is
   intended for use with any time varying media content (typically
   audio/* or video/*). The length of time is represented in seconds
   without any units indication.

   This document obsoletes RFC 2424.

2. Conventions used in this document

   The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
   "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED",  "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in
   this document are to be interpreted as described in RFC-2119.


3. Content-Duration Header Field

   Time varying media contents, for example, a spoken voice message or
   a video clip, have an inherent time duration.  Many audio and video
   encodings may include their duration as header information or may
   allow accurate calculation based on the byte length of the data.
   However, it may be useful to present the time duration of the
   content in a MIME header to allow its simple determination without
   dealing with the actual content.


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2.1 Syntax

   The Content-Duration field's value is a single number specifying the
   time duration in seconds of the content.  Formally:

   duration := "Content-Duration" ":" 1*10DIGIT

   Note that practically (though highly unlikely in MIME media), the
   upper bound on the numerical value of the time duration is (2^^31 -
   1) or 2147483647.

2.2 Semantics

   This field represents the time duration of the associated time
   varying media content. The time duration is noted in seconds with no
   units tag. The time value should be exact, however the exact value
   of the time duration cannot be known without opening the content and
   playing it. If an exact value must be known, then the latter method
   should be used. This mechanism simply allows placing a sender
   determined time duration value in the header for easy access.

   Though there are several ways to present this duration to the
   recipient (e.g. with the inbox headers, when audio attachment
   opened), the actual use of this field on reception is a local
   implementation issue.

2.3 Example

   In this example the content duration represents 33 seconds:

        Content-Duration: 33

3. VPIM Usage

   The Content-Duration header field for the audio/32KADPCM sub-type is
   a useful component of the VPIM specification [VPIM2]. All VPIM
   Messages MUST contain this sub-type to carry the audio of a voice
   message. It may be useful in some instances (e.g. viewing on a
   simple MIME or non-MIME desktop) to have the time duration of the
   voice message available without having to open the audio content.


4. Security Considerations

   This definition introduces the option of explicitly identifying the
   time duration of an audio/* or video/* content outside of the binary
   data that forms the content. In some environments (though likely not
   the majority), the identification of the actual time duration in a
   header field may be a security issue and as a result should not be
   noted. Reliance on the time indicated in this header field cannot be
   trusted for the purposes of determining the exact size of the data.
   The exact length of the data must be determined by examining the
   data itself.


5. References


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   [DUR] G. Parsons and G. Vaudreuil, "Content Duration MIME Header
   Definition", RFC 2424, September 1998.

   [MIME2] Freed, N., and N. Borenstein, "Multipurpose Internet Mail
   Extensions (MIME) Part Two: Media Types", RFC 2046, November 1996.

   [VPIM2] Vaudreuil, G., and G. Parsons, "Voice Profile for Internet
   Mail - version 2", RFC 2421, September 1998.

   [VPIM2R2] Vaudreuil, G., and G. Parsons, "Voice Profile for Internet
   Mail - version 2", <draft-ietf-vpim-vpimv2r2-01.txt>, November 2000.

6. Authors' Addresses

   Glenn W. Parsons
   Nortel Networks
   P.O. Box 3511, Station C
   Ottawa, ON  K1Y 4H7
   Canada

   Phone: +1-613-763-7582
   Fax:   +1-416-597-7005

   EMail: gparsons@nortelnetworks.com


   Gregory M. Vaudreuil
   Lucent Technologies
   17080 Dallas Parkway
   Dallas, TX  75248-1905
   United States

   Phone/Fax: +1-972-733-2722
   EMail: gregv@lucent.com

























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7. Full Copyright Statement

   Copyright (C) The Internet Society (2000).  All Rights Reserved.

   This document and translations of it may be copied and furnished to
   others, and derivative works that comment on or otherwise explain it
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   are included on all such copies and derivative works.  However, this
   document itself may not be modified in any way, such as by removing
   the copyright notice or references to the Internet Society or other
   Internet organizations, except as needed for the purpose of
   developing Internet standards in which case the procedures for
   copyrights defined in the Internet Standards process must be
   followed, or as required to translate it into languages other than
   English.

   The limited permissions granted above are perpetual and will not be
   revoked by the Internet Society or its successors or assigns.

   This document and the information contained herein is provided on an
   "AS IS" basis and THE INTERNET SOCIETY AND THE INTERNET ENGINEERING
   TASK FORCE DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING
   BUT NOT LIMITED TO ANY WARRANTY THAT THE USE OF THE INFORMATION
   HEREIN WILL NOT INFRINGE ANY RIGHTS OR ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
   MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.































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