wisner@mica.Berkeley.EDU (Bill Wisner) (07/05/89)
> But the simple fact that ^A is not a printable >character means that mail MTAs are going to have a major problem in >mailing that message to someone. You don't mail \001s, you mail messages. The sequence \001\001\001\001 is only used in saved mail files, not when sending messages. \001\001\001\001 is unambiguous. It is a string that is not likely to appear in a mail message. On the other hand, I see "^From " in messages quite frequently. Well, actually, it's "^>From " that I see frequently. UNIX's stoopid mail format insures that no line which starts with the word From will survive intact. This mangling of mail is completely unwarranted. This sorry excuse for a mailbox format should have been retired years ago. Bill Wisner wisner@mica.berkeley.edu ucbvax!mica!wisner I'm not the NRA either.
nelson@sun.soe.clarkson.edu (Russ Nelson) (07/05/89)
In article <WISNER.89Jul4170048@anableps.berkeley.edu> wisner@mica.Berkeley.EDU (Bill Wisner) writes:
\001\001\001\001 is unambiguous. It is a string that is not likely to
appear in a mail message. On the other hand, I see "^From " in messages
quite frequently. Well, actually, it's "^>From " that I see frequently.
You only think you have a problem with binmail format. Actually you
have a problem with programs that forget that "From " in the body of
messages has been quoted. Even /usr/ucb/mail forgets to make a
distinction between outputting a message to a mailbox and a file. The
same command serves for both purposes, creating your perfectly valid
objection.
I may have a problem with MMDF format if it assumes that you never send
in your mail message(s). In fact, sending
is not a totally crazy thing to do. I just did it twice, and since things
always come in threes, here's a third:
Of course, you people reading this via news undoubtedly had no problem with
the ^A lines. Anyone who had this message mailed to them via MMDF may
not see this.
--
--russ (nelson@clutx [.bitnet | .clarkson.edu])
Democracy needs capitalism like a fish needs a bicycle.wisner@mica.Berkeley.EDU (Bill Wisner) (07/05/89)
The person I never expected to see posting with a valid address, Russ Nelson, writes: >I may have a problem with MMDF format if it assumes that you never send > >in your mail message(s). In fact, sending > >is not a totally crazy thing to do. I just did it twice, and since things >always come in threes, here's a third: > >Of course, you people reading this via news undoubtedly had no problem with >the ^A lines. Anyone who had this message mailed to them via MMDF may >not see this. Wrong. Totally, utterly wrong. USENET and Internet mail are both equally incapable of handling control characters. Those three lines, on which you ostensibly types \001s, are absolutely empty. So, you see, sending \001\001\001\001 *is* a totally crazy thing to do. Neither news nor mail are required to handle control characters according to the rules, so they don't. Bill Wisner wisner@mica.berkeley.edu ucbvax!mica!wisner I'm not the NRA either.
david@ms.uky.edu (David Herron -- One of the vertebrae) (07/05/89)
In article <NELSON.89Jul4220946@sun.soe.clarkson.edu>, nelson@sun.soe.clarkson.edu (Russ Nelson) writes: > In article <WISNER.89Jul4170048@anableps.berkeley.edu> wisner@mica.Berkeley.EDU (Bill Wisner) writes: > \001\001\001\001 is unambiguous. It is a string that is not likely to > appear in a mail message. On the other hand, I see "^From " in messages > quite frequently. Well, actually, it's "^>From " that I see frequently. > > You only think you have a problem with binmail format. > > I may have a problem with MMDF format if it assumes that you never send > Hmm... that line didn't have any ^A's in it by the time it reached meee.. And I read this via news. > Of course, you people reading this via news undoubtedly had no problem with > the ^A lines. Anyone who had this message mailed to them via MMDF may > not see this. Considering that a line of 4 ^A's in the middle of a message is very much more unlikely than a line beginning with From<space>, I have little problem with MMDF's mailbox format. A problem with both the ucbmail and mush ports into the MMDF environment is that neither makes a distinction between saving a message to a mailbox and sending it out a pipe. In both cases the ^A's are sent out... It's on my list of things to do ;-) I see two solutions... One is a directory hierarchy line MH. It seems fast enough, but the programs don't always handle >100 mailfolders very well. See, I keep a lot of mail around. Another is a database of some sort. "Most newsreaders are better than most mail readers." Is that how the line goes? -- <- David Herron; an MMDF guy <david@ms.uky.edu> <- ska: David le casse\*' {rutgers,uunet}!ukma!david, david@UKMA.BITNET <- <- New word for the day: Obnoxity -- an act of obnoxiousness
lear@NET.BIO.NET (Eliot Lear) (07/05/89)
Actually, strictly speaking, USENET software can handle a number of control characters, like ESCAPE. Don't you ever see those messages with vt100 underline codes? Aside from that, I agree with you about the `minimalist' mail format. There are a number of techniques that could be and have been used to improve matters, the most common of which seems to be that of simply prepending a byte count to the message so that you know exactly where it ends. This prevents the needless butchering of innocent Froms (there! I got in some religion!). -- Eliot Lear [lear@net.bio.net]
tale@pawl.rpi.edu (David C Lawrence) (07/06/89)
In <Jul.5.02.12.10.1989.3266@NET.BIO.NET> lear@NET.BIO.NET (Eliot Lear) writes:
lear> Actually, strictly speaking, USENET software can handle a number of
lear> control characters, like ESCAPE. Don't you ever see those messages
lear> with vt100 underline codes?
Strictly speaking, most USENET software doesn't handle \027, at least
not around here. I had put in a trojan horse to close people's
windows in Suntools when they read my message ... the mail ones
worked, but news wouldn't. The ESC was being stripped.
Most of the underlining you see being done in news articles is
accomplished because \008 does get passed undisturbed. To underline
something, you can follow each character to be underlined with a \008_
and it will come out however your environment is configured to handle
this special case. (In GNUS, I don't get anything but a bunch of
seeming gibberish because the underlined region is all expanded.)
Dave
--
(setq mail '("tale@pawl.rpi.edu" "tale@itsgw.rpi.edu" "tale@rpitsmts.bitnet"))
"Drinking coffee for instant relaxation? That's like drinking
alcohol for instant motor skills." -- Marc Pricewisner@mica.Berkeley.EDU (Bill Wisner) (07/07/89)
In article <113918@sun.Eng.Sun.COM> argv%eureka@Sun.COM (Dan Heller) writes: >> On the other hand, I see "^From " in messages >> quite frequently. Well, actually, it's "^>From " that I see frequently. >> UNIX's stoopid mail format insures that no line which starts with the word >> From will survive intact. This mangling of mail is completely unwarranted. >> This sorry excuse for a mailbox format should have been retired years ago. >Several problems with your observations I think. No, I don't think so. >1) Any line that starts with "From " will turn into a ">From" line as soon > as a sendmail system finds it. You're blaming an MUA for a fault of the > MTA. This has nothing to do with Mail, Mush or MH. I didn't blame the bloody MUA, I blamed the mail format. That was the topic of my message, got it? Not which interface is best but which format is best. And UNIX mail format is not best. >2) "From " is not the message separator -- the message separator is: > "From <address> <date(1)>\n" That is as may be, but none of the delivery agents that use the UNIX mail format bother to make that little distinction. Lines that begin with "From " (or even "from ") get munched. >I have just pointed out that logistically, the two formats are functionally >the same. The advantage that unix-mail format has over MMDF format is the >fact that you can't send ^A's in mail messages. Baloney. MMDF will never modify a message regardless of what a line begins with. And you can't mail \001s *period*. Won't fly. Mailers don't do it. It has nothing to do with the file format you use. >As a result, you can't mail MMDF folders to another site any more easily >than you can send a unix-format folder. In both cases, the folder has to >be modified somehow. What does this have to do with anything? Nobody has said anything in this discussion about mailing folders except for you. Sending a folder via normal mail paths is insane. You simply can't expect them to arrive intact, although that might happen if you're lucky. Bill Wisner wisner@mica.berkeley.edu ucbvax!mica!wisner I'm not the NRA either.