Attachments FAQ
UUencode and MIME FAQ
When BINARY files need to be sent via the internet email system
there needs to be a mechanism in place to convert these binary attachments
into
an ASCII (Text) format. Binary files come in many flavors:
- Sound Files
- Photos
- Graphic Files
- Video
- Software
The sender of the binary file needs to know what format you can work with on
your
end. The two most common methods of encoding a binary attachment today are
MIME
(Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) and UUENCODE. Let's discuss
UUENCODE first.
-
UUencode
- UUencode is a software utility that converts a binary
file to an ASCII or text file so it can be sent as an
attachment to an email message or downloaded from a newsgroup. Since
email messages MUST be TEXT, not BINARY information, UUencode
disguises non-text files as text so they can be included in a mail message.
When the message is received, the recipient, or their email program must have a
means of DECODING the attachment. This process of decoding a UUencoded
message is called UUdecode.
- Some of the more recent email programs like Eudora Pro automatically
perform this operation for you. However, if you don't have a program to
automatically decode or reverse the process of UUencoding, then you will need
to have access to a separate program which will UUdecode the message
back to its original state. I recommend a program in the Windows environment
which can be downloaded from this site. The program is X-ferPro 173k.
- Please note this program is ONLY necessary, if your email package
can not automatically handle MIME or UUencoded messages.
-
MIME
- MIME stands for Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension, a standard for
identifying the type of data contained in a file based on its extension. MIME
is an Internet protocol that allows you to send binary files across the
Internet as attachments to email messages. This includes graphics, photos,
sound, video files and formatted text documents. MIME has to negotiate many
different operating systems and types of software to perform this amazing feat.
Its invention has been a major step forward in the exchange of non-text
information over the internet.
- E-mail programs that allow you to send and receive these types of files are
said to be MIME-compliant. Eudora Pro and the
Eudora LITE version allow the sending of MIME attachments and will
automatically convert these types of attachments on the fly WITHOUTseparate file and then use X-ferPro 173k.
So now that you thoroughly understand the ins and outs of email attachments,
I need you to tell me how you would like me to attach the file(s) that I will
be sending to you.