-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- - -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- If you can't beat `em, join `em -- hence I wade into the fray.... Amanda Walker writes:

To: cypherpunks@toad.com Subject: MIME acceptance test--where's the break-even point? Content-Disposition: Inline

This message contains 'text/enriched'-format data. Do you want to view it using the 'cat' command (y/n) [y] ?

Yeah, I'm sure that'll help a lot.... [...]

This message, for example, is formatted as <fixed>text/enriched</ fixed> instead of <fixed>text/plain</fixed>. It's still readable on 80-column <smaller>ASCII</smaller> terminals. It's got some extra stuff, but so does every <smaller>PGP</smaller>-signed message, or worse yet a <smaller>PEM</smaller>-signed message, and I would argue that the <smaller>MIME</smaller> formatting itself is no more objectionable than these, just as I would argue that <fixed>base64</ fixed> encoding (the format that graphics generally appear in when <smaller>MIME</smaller> encapsulated)

BTW, is that what that piece of obscura from Peter Cassidy the other day was supposed to be ?

is no more objectionable than other mechanisms that serve the same purpose, such as <smaller>PGP</ smaller> "<smaller>ASCII</smaller> armor", uuencoding, etc. [...] Do you find this message to be "out of bounds" the way you found my (intentionally excessive) <smaller>GIF</smaller> signature from a while back to be?

Yes and no. The .GIF you sent before caused my copy of elm to dump core, which was disconcerting but easy to remedy. I doubted that the picture you'd sent was worth viewing, so I didn't bother trying to view it with xv on my own. This message didn't prompt any error messages from elm, but it was a nightmare to read, thanks to the plethora of angle-bracketed font instructions embedded throughout the text.

If so, where's the boundary between this message and the innumerable <smaller>PGP</smaller> formatted messages we see come by on this list?

The PGP-formatted messages don't cause my mailer to dump core, and don't have any embedded command sequences in their bodies, so I don't go cross-eyed trying to read them. That's a pretty clear line for me. YMMV.

How far are we willing to inconvenience the least common denominator in order to provide the services we want (whether those services be authentication & encryption, multimedia content, or anything else)? Where to the cost and benefit curves cross?

Actually, I wish you'd send a full test suite of MIME messages to the list, so I could compile a comprehensive list of the things I have to ask the tech support people here to fix. My copy of elm proclaims itself to be MIME-aware but hasn't done very well in practice. Another GIF enclosure would be handy, because I didn't keep the previous one. - - -L. Futplex McCarthy - -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.1 iQCVAwUBLvE9zGf7YYibNzjpAQHUHwP/UAyrTWjxiZDQBeSOL8cTCQ8xjM+lpsCN doALb8TtJCrypS0ihZzCZ6VpDi9E/JxKPF9lnLXqzCH0LVua3j0eiNXz7TCVfFP6 clziWY9RExiTRfREC8aphNw2XRVetjfhRIOsiBj7lSqNodKnN5GS2sUEDtIBNMdL EMfHAGIWTnU= =LxLk - -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- - --- [This message has been signed by an auto-signing service. A valid signature means only that it has been received at the address corresponding to the signature and forwarded.] -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.6.2 Comment: Gratis auto-signing service iQBFAwUBLvE+8SoZzwIn1bdtAQErRQF+OLFnCDXeznWHQws8LkxatRgaf6+F1ZuK N5e9/i52pI1gNQ4MQL5kEyWzXdH0XmMM =LceU -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----