Subject line 'space' character is lost when sending mail?

Question

Hi,
I'm using JavaMail, and when sending a mail with a subject line that is longer than 62 characters, the last space before the 63rd character becomes a linefeed. This means that when the recipient receives the e-mail, the space in the subject line is actually dropped (becomes a linefeed).
For example. I send an email with the following subject line: "New User Setup [ITNUS-0005] User Setup Progress Report for: Louise Gans".
The recipient will receive the following subject: "New User Setup [ITNUS-0005] User Setup Progress Report for: LouiseGans".
Note the missing space between "Louise Gans". Perhaps someone could test sending out that subject line, and see if they get the same problem?
Looking at the message source on the recipient client, it shows a line feed / new line where that space is supposed to be.
Using MS Outlook or GroupWise or another mail client, the subject lines gets sent through perfectly using the same mail server (Groupwise Internet Agent 7.0.3), but using JavaMail to send the mail through that mail server gives me the space problem.
Can anybody shed some light on why this is happening? I would really appreciate the help.
Here is an example of the code I am testing with:
public class SendHtml {
     public static void main(String[] argv) {
          new SendHtml();
     public SendHtml() {
          String  to = "[email protected]";
          String subject = "New User Setup [ITNUS-0005] User Setup Progress Report for: Louise Gans";
          String from = "[email protected]";
          String cc = null;
          String bcc = null;
          String url = null;
          String mailhost = "mail.server.co.za";
          String mailer = "sendhtml";
          String protocol = null, host = null, user = null, password = null;
          String record = null;     // name of folder in which to record mail
          boolean debug = false;
          BufferedReader in =
               new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(System.in));
          try {
               Properties props = System.getProperties();
               if (mailhost != null) {
                    props.put("mail.smtp.host", mailhost);
               // Get a Session object
               Session session = Session.getInstance(props, null);
               // construct the message
               Message msg = new MimeMessage(session);
               if (from != null) {
                    msg.setFrom(new InternetAddress(from));
               else {
                    msg.setFrom();
               msg.setRecipients(Message.RecipientType.TO,
                         InternetAddress.parse(to, false));
               if (cc != null)
                    msg.setRecipients(Message.RecipientType.CC,
                              InternetAddress.parse(cc, false));
               if (bcc != null)
                    msg.setRecipients(Message.RecipientType.BCC,
                              InternetAddress.parse(bcc, false));
               msg.setSubject(subject);
               collect(in, msg);
               msg.setHeader("X-Mailer", mailer);
               msg.setSentDate(new Date());
               // send the thing off
               Transport.send(msg);
               System.out.println("\nMail was sent successfully.");
               // Keep a copy, if requested.
               if (record != null) {
                    // Get a Store object
                    Store store = null;
                    if (url != null) {
                         URLName urln = new URLName(url);
                         store = session.getStore(urln);
                         store.connect();
                    } else {
                         if (protocol != null)          
                              store = session.getStore(protocol);
                         else
                              store = session.getStore();
                         // Connect
                         if (host != null || user != null || password != null)
                              store.connect(host, user, password);
                         else
                              store.connect();
                    // Get record Folder.  Create if it does not exist.
                    Folder folder = store.getFolder(record);
                    if (folder == null) {
                         System.err.println("Can't get record folder.");
                         System.exit(1);
                    if (!folder.exists())
                         folder.create(Folder.HOLDS_MESSAGES);
                    Message[] msgs = new Message[1];
                    msgs[0] = msg;
                    folder.appendMessages(msgs);
                    System.out.println("Mail was recorded successfully.");
          } catch (Exception e) {
               e.printStackTrace();
     public void collect(BufferedReader in, Message msg)
     throws MessagingException, IOException {
          String line;
          String subject = msg.getSubject();
          StringBuffer sb = new StringBuffer();
          sb.append("<HTML>\n");
          sb.append("<HEAD>\n");
          sb.append("<TITLE>\n");
          sb.append(subject + "\n");
          sb.append("</TITLE>\n");
          sb.append("</HEAD>\n");
          sb.append("<BODY>\n");
          sb.append("<H1>" + subject + "</H1>" + "\n");
          sb.append("</BODY>\n");
          sb.append("</HTML>\n");
          msg.setDataHandler(new DataHandler(
                    new ByteArrayDataSource(sb.toString(), "text/html")));
}

Answer 1

The header is being "folded" as described in RFC 2822 section 2.2.3.
The folding doesn't lose the space if unfolding is done properly.
Perhaps the recipient mail program isn't handling unfolding properly?
If so, please report the bug to the owner of that program.
If you need to work around such a buggy program, you can set the
System property "mail.mime.foldtext" to "false" to disable all folding
in JavaMail.