Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!mit-eddie!uw-beaver!blake!ogccse!schaefer
From: schaefer@ogccse.ogc.edu (Barton E. Schaefer)
Newsgroups: comp.mail.misc
Subject: Re: binmail vs MMDF mail file format
Message-ID: <3563@ogccse.ogc.edu>
Date: 5 Jul 89 17:15:00 GMT
References: <113461@sun.Eng.Sun.COM> <1518@cbnewsc.ATT.COM> <113567@sun.Eng.Sun.COM> <1526@cbnewsc.ATT.COM> <WISNER.89Jul3114848@anableps.berkeley.edu> <113637@sun.Eng.Sun.COM> <WISNER.89Jul4170048@anableps.berkeley.edu>
Reply-To: schaefer@ogccse.UUCP (Barton E. Schaefer)
Organization: Oregon Graduate Center, Beaverton, OR
Lines: 46

I can't post to alt.religion.computers, so if anybody really wants that
group included, you'll have to add it to any followups.

In article <113637@sun.Eng.Sun.COM> island!argv@sun.com (Dan Heller) writes:
} I don't want to start a religious war on this (and if anyone cares to
} continue this conversation, start a new message; don't reply to this one
} and discuss this issue).  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 can't mail MMDF folders without a
} probable headache.

In article <WISNER.89Jul4170048@anableps.berkeley.edu> wisner@mica.Berkeley.EDU (Bill Wisner) writes:
} 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.

You've never wanted to mail an entire folder from one place to another?
Why shouldn't you be able to "mua somewhere < folder"?  (I use "mua" as
the generic MUA.)  It seems silly to have to uuencode (or the equivalent)
what should primarily be a text file.

Of course, using MH, you can't do that anyway because a folder is not a
file, so who cares. :-)

} \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.

Mush handles lines beginning with "From " correctly.  It also concedes
that there are a lot of broken mailers that don't.  Heck, with a little
work, the phrase "Bill Wisner Slept Here" could be used as the separator.
:-) :-)  But of course that's at least as silly as "From " followed by a
bunch of address and date information.

As has been pointed out before, the question really is whther one cares
about compatibility.  NOT *convertability* -- that's easy -- but the
ability to switch back and forth between different MUAs without doing
any intermediate work.
-- 
Bart Schaefer           "And if you believe that, you'll believe anything."
                                                            -- DangerMouse
CSNET / Internet                schaefer@cse.ogc.edu
UUCP                            ...{sequent,tektronix,verdix}!ogccse!schaefer