On Tue, 24 Sep 2002 14:16:49 +0200, Simon Josefsson wrote: > I also recall from a comp.mail.imap discussion that it was the word > "sequence" that caused confusion, some people (me included) regard > "sequences" to be ordered. It was suggested to use the word "set" > throughout the specification instead, since that doesn't imply that > any ordering should be infered. The current document had already been > changed to that effect then, but it seems this is now reverted.
The problem with "set" is that it didn't help; you still have people assuming ordering. "set" is also hard to search for in the document; there are too many false matches. Finally, "sequence" still appeared. I didn't abolish "set", I changed it to "sequence set". Note that both message sequence numbers and UIDs are strictly increasing, although UIDs don't necessarily increase monotonically. So, in that sense, they both are sequences. Hence "sequence set", a "set of sequences".
