ietf-822
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Re: Is 8BIT ESTMP really needed

2001-05-09 04:13:26
In <ilulmo8vwue(_dot_)fsf(_at_)barbar(_dot_)josefsson(_dot_)org> Simon 
Josefsson <simon(_at_)josefsson(_dot_)org> writes:

Gnus used to (or maybe it still does) encode binary attachments as
QP/B64 depending on which resulted in the smallest size.  As it
happened, PDF files often contain lots of ASCII and only a little
binary data, so it would often be encoded as QP.

In addition of causing problems with QP-encoded binary contents in
some clients, up/down-conversion of the PDF file sometimes caused the
content to be unreadable.  So it's not only an issue of MD5 or digital
signatures, but of actually being able to transfer the data.  So in
practice QP seem to be "for text only".

I think the only safe way to encode application types in QP would be to
encode ALL CRLFs as =0D=0A, as in one of my examples yesterday:
        foo=0Dbar=0Abax=0D=0A=CRLF
Would PDF files survive intact if the downcoding was always done in that
way?

-- 
Charles H. Lindsey ---------At Home, doing my own thing------------------------
Tel: +44 161 436 6131 Fax: +44 161 436 6133   Web: http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~chl
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Clerewood Ave, CHEADLE, SK8 3JU, U.K.
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