From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: lm@mcvoy.com (Larry McVoy) Date: Sun, 12 Mar 2017 17:00:14 -0700 Subject: [TUHS] attachments: MIME and uuencode In-Reply-To: References: <71748884-ac1a-d565-aa08-80f9220594ac@mhorton.net> <47519b01-0ef1-412e-8048-4494cd5d13f9@SG2APC01FT011.eop-APC01.prod.protection.outlook.com> Message-ID: <20170313000013.GF13938@mcvoy.com> I used to have an undocumented mail service on my workstation at Sun. I could send mail with a subject line specifying what I wanted and it sent it to me. Mainly used it when I was teaching at Stanford and I wanted to grab stuff but couldn't get into Sun's network from the outside. In fact, just found the script, it only worked if I was coming from lm at CS.Stanford.EDU or lm at Sunburn.Stanford.EDU so I must have been worried about security. I had a different one that I made available publicly that served up all the papers in /u/lm/Doc/postscript/. On Sun, Mar 12, 2017 at 07:41:32PM -0400, Gregg Levine wrote: > Hello! > Jason, that is amazing. Can you e-mail me steps you took? But please > do so off of list. > ----- > Gregg C Levine gregg.drwho8 at gmail.com > "This signature fought the Time Wars, time and again." > > > On Sun, Mar 12, 2017 at 1:28 AM, wrote: > > As much as I despise the whole ???email server is my file server???, the thing > > is that email clients are cross platform, and an easy way to get data in and > > out of a server, and out to other people. SMTP+UUENCODE/MIME is basically > > the best peer to peer network that is still going strong, since RFC 821 in > > 1982! Naturally other email systems existed prior to this, but SMTP let you > > easily send across the internet, in a method that basically still works to > > this day, although servers have become more selective on who they talk to, > > thanks to the rise of SPAM.. > > > > > > > > I just fired up 4.3 BSD Uwsic, and setup an external DNS, and right away I???m > > able to send an email, and I???m able to receive it on gmail: > > > > > > > > From: The Not Ready for Prime Time Super User root at csl3.wisc.edu > > > > > > > > Compared to what a disaster FTP turned out with it???s active/passive port > > games, SMTP with it???s relay based nature is still the easiest way to send & > > receive data. Add in something like Microsoft Exhcange, which has > > persistent and shared data stores, it???s quite easily to setup ???public > > folders??? and keep binaries in there. Of course you???d be crazy to put > > ancient email servers directly onto the internet, but you can easily setup > > forwarding/spooling gateways like postfix, to process inbound mail, and > > deliver it to your ancient UNIX/VMS/MacOS/Windows server of choice. I route > > mine through MS Office 365, but backend on Exchange 5.5 as I can use the > > Outlook client on MS-DOS, MacOS, and OS/2 to easily get files around if > > needed. Add in stunnel, and you can even use ???modern??? IMAP clients against > > Exchange 5.5... Not that I???d recommend you doing something like this... lol > > > > > > > > Sent from Mail for Windows 10 > > > > > > > > From: Dan Cross > > Sent: Sunday, 12 March 2017 9:16 AM > > To: Mary Ann Horton > > Cc: TUHS main list > > Subject: Re: [TUHS] attachments: MIME and uuencode > > > > > > > > On Sat, Mar 11, 2017 at 6:05 PM, Mary Ann Horton wrote: > > > > Possible? Yes. Convenient? No. > > > > You could cat several uuencode files together and send them in one email. > > You'd have to edit them on the receiving end into separate files and > > uudecode them separately. In practice, you'd uuencode a tarball. > > > > MIME was a major advance, and what's telling is that 25 years later, > > SMTP/MIME is still the standard. > > > > > > > > This is so interesting. Not to be argumentative about it but I felt it was > > actually something of a regression. Something like making a file available > > via an FTP server (possible in an executable but unreadable directory with > > an obscure name) or just in some directory in an organization where a > > filesystem was shared and sending a pointer to the file via email seemed > > much more efficient, particularly if one was sending to multiple recipients. > > Attaching files to email as MIME components felt like trying to turn email > > into a filesystem, and SMTP into a file transfer protocol. The way I saw it, > > email was email and we already had file transfer protocols.... > > > > > > > > It seemed like MIME really took off when Microsoft embraced it; before that, > > plain ol' text seemed much more common. My sense at the time was that > > networked filesystems and services like FTP (or the then-nascent HTTP) were > > far less commonplace on the MS platform, so email as a content distribution > > mechanism was more natural in that world. I was somewhat dismayed at the > > inability to make Windows users see the light; in retrospect, of course, > > this just means that I myself was missing something critical. > > > > > > > > Mary Ann, why did you consider it such a step forward? I'm really curious > > about the reasoning from folks involved with such things at the time. > > > > > > > > - Dan C. > > > > > > > > -- --- Larry McVoy lm at mcvoy.com http://www.mcvoy.com/lm