Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!ginosko!gem.mps.ohio-state.edu!apple!agate!shelby!barry@playfair
From: barry@playfair.STANFORD.EDU (barry)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: GIF HELP (More info)!!
Message-ID: <33@playfair.STANFORD.EDU>
Date: 22 Oct 89 04:48:59 GMT
References: <2153@ucrmath.UCR.EDU>
Sender: Barrett P. Eynon <barry@playfair.stanford.edu>
Reply-To: barry@playfair.UUCP (Barrett P. Eynon)
Organization: Stanford University
Lines: 41

In article <2153@ucrmath.UCR.EDU> deano@ucrmath.UCR.EDU () writes:
>I didn't give many details in my first posting so I thought I'd fix that in my
>second plee for help! 
>
>Well, I'm running FTP on a Sun 4/280-32R1 running SunOS 4.0.3. I open the
>remote server. set the type to binary then execute a get or mget to retrieve
>the file I want. I then exit ftp and download the file to my mac using
>XMODEM 3.4 the command xmodem -sbyl foo.gif. The receiveing program was
>either Microphone II or Versaterm 4.0 I've tried both!! Any Ideas??? Has
>anyone actually done this? I was able to get the ones from SUMEX but I've been
>trying to get the files on hubcap.clemson.edu and on uxe.cso.uiuc.edu!
>The GIFs on SUMEX have been binhexed so they don't present
>a problem. does FTP have a line length limit or perhaps a ascii char.
>limitation of some form?
>                                        Thanks in advance
>
>deano@ucrmath.ucr.edu

Well, actually, this is a rather nice description of all the right 
things to do in downloading a GIF file to the Mac. I have done it
in exactly the same way myself. The only two details you do not
mention, and therefore probably where your problem lies, are:

1) You must change the protocol to "Binary Ymodem" instead of 
"MacBinary Ymodem" in Versaterm. GIF files are machine-independent
binary files, and if your terminal program tries to translate them
as MacBinary encoded files, you end up with garbage.

2) You have to have a clean 8-bit path to your Unix host. If you 
dial directly in to a modem port on your machine, this is probably
not a problem, but for instance when I access my Unix account at
Stanford I dial into an EtherTip, and I have to turn off the escape
and flow control at the tip and then use rlogin with the -8 modifier
to get an 8-bit path to my machine. If you have successfully downloaded
MacBinary files (.bin) then you do not have this problem, so see
1) above. 

Good luck.
Barry Eynon
barry@playfair.stanford.edu        -ARPA
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