If a
delimiter is allowed to have an arbitrary amount of whitespace
between the boundary and the CRLF, then a parser must have an
arbitrary amount of lookahead in order to determine whether a
line is a delimiter or not.
Not quite.
It isn't allowed to have this. I hope this is clearer now.
[sigh] I wish you hadn't said that.
Actually, it's probably better that the spec be "too tight"
than that it be too broad. I was about to say, "white space processing
in boundary scanning doesn't have to be such a nightmare", but then I
brought more neurons to bear on what's happening. We're trying to
force binary through that-which-was a text mode service. Right?
If that's correct, then use Base64. Did the light go on?
(am I even on the right list? Marilyn told me this morning not to
talk before having my coffee) I think the case was brought forth
where Base64 isn't an option. Fine. Then just don't call it MIME
in that case.
[now back to reading Crocker and Borenstein & Freed
before I run my mouth any more]
--
Rick Troth <troth(_at_)rice(_dot_)edu>, Rice University, Information Systems
(grieving for Michael Daniel Smith and Alexander Tyler Smith)