X-Message-Number: 17167
Date: Wed, 01 Aug 2001 03:46:30 -0400
From: "Kevin Q. Brown" <>
Subject: Re: HTML Encoding

In CryoNet message #17150 James Swayze pointed out that
the entire body of message #17146 was truncated because
it began with HTML encoding and then he asked:

> Kevin, when might Cryonet upgrade to the ability to accept HTML
> and MIME? It would be nice to have graphics or be able to share
> a picture of something rather than make people chase down a
> link when we have a graphic to share.

James, I have three main concerns with non-ASCII attachments:
  (1) accessibility
  (2) bandwidth, and
  (3) malware (viruses/worms).

Accessibility

Plain ASCII is understood by all mail programs.  Even though
probably a majority of CryoNet readers now can read email with
HTML/JavaScript or even binary attachments, not everyone can.
(Also, of those who can, certainly many do not _want_ such
attachments.)  Even plain ASCII has some problems.  For example,
some people post messages with extremely long lines.  Unfortunately,
automatic reformatting to shorter lines is difficult to do properly
in all cases (such as tabular data interspersed with long lines)
so I gave up on that.

Bandwidth

HTML and, especially, base64-encoded binaries require a lot
more bytes than plain ASCII.  As I discovered recently,
large digests (over 100 KB) not only take longer to download,
but also take much longer to distribute.

Malware (viruses/worms)

ASCII is inert; it doesn't do anything unexpected to your computer.
The CryoNet digests have been remarkably free of malware
(and spam) because the software (A) limits posting to recognized
addresses (i.e. subscribers) and (B) it truncates messages when
they begin attachments of HTML or binaries.  The _entire_ body of
message #17146 was skipped because it was sent _only_ as HTML.
It is more common for a posting to be sent in both plain ASCII
and HTML, so that truncating the message at the beginning of
the HTML only eliminates redundancy.

Of course, if you want a mailing list that does not limit itself
to the "lowest common denominator" in mail formats, then you
certainly can create your own.  Rick Potvin has created his own
forum at:
    http://network54.com/forum/82078
and I expect there is room for more.  Good luck.

    Kevin Q. Brown
    

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