NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #31/NN_1992_31.iso/spool/comp/mail/mime/56

Internet Message Format | 1992-12-28 | 42.0 KB

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From: [e-mail] (Edward Vielmetti)
Newsgroups: comp.mail.mime
Subject: MIME Frequently Asked Questions
Date: 28 Dec 1992 20:32:52 GMT
Organization: Msen, Inc. -- Ann Arbor, Michigan
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Archive-name: mime-faq

0.1 Introduction

This is a skeleton of a Frequently Asked Questions document about
MIME, the multipurpose and multi-media standard for Internet mail.  It
is intended to elicit responses and information so that it can be
filled out and turned into a "real" FAQ with frequent distribution.

0.2 Information wanted:

Anything that's missing here please add it in!  I have more or less
raided the PPP FAQ for structure, but there are some gaps as far as
content goes.

0.3 Changes from the previous version

An earlier version of this FAQ was posted in mid December, 1992; since
then it has more than tripled in size.  Future versions will have
changes noted in the table of contents, for now assume that all is new.

1. INDEX TO THE FAQ:

2. What is MIME?

2.1 Introduction
2.2 MIME features which may or may not be present
2.3 MIME glossary
2.4 MIME-relevant RFC's
2.5 Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) working groups
2.6 Newsgroups and mailing lists

3.  How to:
3.1 Register a new MIME type

4. Real MIME questions with answers

5. Free MIME software packages.
5.1 metamail
5.2 MIXMH 0.2
5.3 MH 6.8
5.4 Pine
5.5 c-client
5.6 Andrew
5.7 elm
5.8 PP
5.9 MIME tools for NeXT
5.10 Conversions from other mail systems
5.10.1 uuencode to MIME
5.10.2 Sun OpenWindows mail to MIME
5.10.3 NeXTmail to MIME
5.11 MIME for VMS MAIL (HUyMailer)

6. MIME information sites
6.1 Anonymous FTP
6.2 Mail based servers
6.2.1 Eitech "ServiceMail"
6.3 WAIS
6.4 Gopher
6.5 MIME CD-ROM

7. Commercial MIME software packages, and published books
7.1 Books and articles
7.1.1 _The Internet Message: Closing the Book with Electronic Mail_
7.1.2 "Connexions", Sept. 1992
7.2 Commercial software
7.2.1 IBM software for OS/2
7.2.2 Innosoft PMDF for VMS
7.2.3 Control Data Systems Mail*Hub package for Control Data MIPS
7.2.4 CCMAIL support for MIME

8.  MIME based mail relays for commercial mail services
8.1 Large national or international providers
8.2 Regional or local providers

!9. (incomplete) Acknowledgements


2.1 Introduction

2.1 Introduction

MIME, the Multi-purpose Internet Mail Extensions, is a freely
available specification that offers a way to interchange multi-media
e-mail among many different computer systems that use Internet mail
standards.

If you were bored with plain text e-mail messages, thanks to MIME you
now can create and read e-mail messages containing these things:

        - images
        - sounds
        - tar files
        - PostScript
        - FTPable file pointers.
        - other stuff

MIME supports not only several pre-defined types of non-textual
message contents, such as 8-bit 8000Hz-sampled mu-LAW audio, GIF image
files, and PostScript programs, but also permits you to define your
own types of message parts.

The ability to create e-mail messages with audio and other non-textual
contents has been around for a while, but almost always as part of a
vendor-specific ``solution.''  This means that you can't create a
message on a NeXT system containing PostScript information and ``Lip
Service'' (NeXT's audio e-mail tool) and easily handle the same
message on an HP 9000/710, a Sun SPARCstation IPC, and a Silicon
Graphics Iris.  That's a problem that MIME helps to solve.

One of the best things about MIME is that it's a "four-wheel drive
protocol", to borrow a description of PhoneNet from Einar Stefferud.
MIME was carefully designed to survive many of the most bizarre
variations of SMTP, UUCP, and Procrustean mail transport protocols,
such as BITNET and MMDF, that like to slice, dice, and stretch the
headers and bodies of e-mail messages.

Here's a useful thing that Dr. Marshall T. Rose does with MIME: he
mails out his SNMP-related newsletter, ``The Simple Times'' as
multi-media e-mail messages in several forms:

        - in a PostScript form, with beautiful typesetting and a
          two-column page layout, suitable for printing on a laser
          printer;

        - in a ``richtext'' form explained in item 4.3, suitable for
          display on a mildly intelligent ASCII terminal; and

        - in a plain text, ordinary message form.

(SNMP is the Simple Network Management Protocol, a low-level network
management facility that has naught to do with MIME per se, but it's
still a Neat Thing that MIME is used in this way.)


2.2 MIME features that may or may not be present.

Implementations of multi-media e-mail need not support the full spec;
it's possible to have a useful product that does not explore all of
the nooks and crannies of the standard.

Furthermore, MIME permits a message to contain alternative parts for
consumption by sites that can't necessarily display or listen to all
the good stuff.

Here is a list of features that someone with a good, functional
mail user agent might include for MIME support:

- Displays GIF, JPEG, and PBM encoded images, e.g. 'xv' in X Windows,
  or (name of windows program here) in Microsoft Windows.

- Displays PostScript parts (e.g. something that prints to a PostScript
  printer, or that invokes GhostScript on an X Window System display,
  or that uses Display PostScript.

- Obtains external body parts via Internet FTP or via mail server.

- Plays audio parts on workstations that support digital audio.

2.3 MIME glossary

Every subculture needs its list of buzzwords, here's a start at a
collection for MIME.

body            the part of a message after the header (the "meat")
external part   a "pointer" to a part available via FTP or other means.
GIF             graphical interchange format for images
header          the To, From, Subject, etc. at the start of a message
JPEG            an image compression standard for still images
mail transport  the "post office", e.g. sendmail, smail, MMDF, etc.
MIME            Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions - RFC 1341
MPEG        an image compression standard for moving pictures
MTA        'mail transport agent'
MUA        'mail user agent', see 'user agent'
multi-media     nebulous marketroid term meaning audio and visual stuff
part            a piece of a MIME message containing some data type
PBM        an image format
PEM             Privacy Enhanced Mail
PostScript      a popular page description language
RFC             request for comments; proposed or standard Internet protocols
richtext        a simple text markup language defined in the MIME specs
SMTP            Simple Mail Transport Protocol - RFC 821
user agent      the end user's mail program, e.g. MH, ELM, /bin/mail, etc.

2.4 MIME-relevant RFCs and other standards

The following RFCs are relevant to people building MIME software.  Not
all of them are standards per se, but you'd be wise to at least have
looked at all of them.  RFC 1341, the MIME specification, is a good
one to know, as is RFC 822.

As an end user, if your mail system is nice to you, you won't really
have to know a whole lot about these things.

Online copies of most RFCs are available via FTP from ftp.nisc.sri.com
as rfc/rfc####.txt or rfc/rfc####.ps (#### is the RFC number without
leading zeroes).

Current MIME stuff.

1341  MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions): Mechanisms for specifying
      and describing the format of Internet message bodies. Borenstein, N.;
      Freed, N.  1992 June; 69 p. (Format: TXT=211117, PS=347082 bytes)
1342  Representation of non-ASCII text in Internet message headers. Moore, K.
      1992 June; 7 p. (Format: TXT=15845 bytes)

Basic E-mail stuff.

822   Standard for the format of ARPA Internet text messages. Crocker, D.
      1982 August 13; 47 p. (Format: TXT=109200 bytes)
1036  Standard for interchange of USENET messages. Horton, M.R.; Adams, R.
      1987 December; 19 p. (Format: TXT=46891 bytes)
1123  Requirements for Internet hosts - application and support. Braden, R.T.,
      ed.  1989 October; 98 p. (Format: TXT=245503 bytes)
1153  Digest message format. Wancho, F.J.  1990 April; 4 p. (Format: TXT=6632
      bytes)
1211  Problems with the maintenance of large mailing lists. Westine, A.;
      Postel, J.B.  1991 March; 54 p. (Format: TXT=96167 bytes)
1225  Post Office Protocol: Version 3. Rose, M.T.  1991 May; 16 p. (Format:
      TXT=37340 bytes)
1314  File format for the exchange of images in the Internet. Katz, A.R.;
      Cohen, D.  1992 April; 23 p. (Format: TXT=54072 bytes)
1319  MD2 Message-Digest algorithm. Kaliski, B.S.  1992 April; 17 p. (Format:
      TXT=25661 bytes)
1320  MD4 Message-Digest algorithm. Rivest, R.L.  1992 April; 20 p. (Format:
      TXT=32407 bytes)
1321  MD5 Message-Digest algorithm. Rivest, R.L.  1992 April; 21 p. (Format:
      TXT=35222 bytes)
1327  Mapping between X.400(1988)/ISO 10021 and RFC 822. Hardcastle-Kille,
      S.E.  1992 May; 113 p. (Format: TXT=228598 bytes)
1339  Remote mail checking protocol. Dorner, S.; Resnick, P.  1992 June; 5 p.
      (Format: TXT=13115 bytes)
1343  User agent configuration mechanism for multimedia mail format
      information. Borenstein, N.  1992 June; 10 p. (Format: TXT=29295,
      PS=59978 bytes)
1344  Implications of MIME for Internet mail gateways. Borenstein, N.  1992
      June; 8 p. (Format: TXT=25872, PS=51812 bytes)
1357  Format for e-mailing bibliographic records. Cohen, D.  1992 July; 13 p.
      (Format: TXT=25021 bytes)

Older pre-MIME efforts at internet multimedia e-mail

1197  Using ODA for translating multimedia information. Sherman, M.  1990
      December; 2 p. (Format: TXT=3620 bytes)
807   Multimedia mail meeting notes. Postel, J.B.  1982 February 9; 6 p.
      (Format: TXT=11633 bytes)
934
1049
1154

2.5 Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) working groups

(ietf-smtp, pem, etc)

2.6 Newsgroups and mailing lists

The newsgroup [comp.mail.mh] contains discussions of MH, which, as of
MH 6.7.8, includes MIME.

There is also a [comp.mail.multi-media] newsgroup, which contains
general discussions of multi-media e-mail, not necessarily MIME.

(ietf wg lists, plus comp.mail.*, etc)

3.  How to.

3.1 Register a new MIME datatype

The IANA registration procedures for new MIME data types are documented
in RFC 1341 on page 68.

4.  Real MIME questions with answers

4.1: What can I use to display MIME messages?

A 4.1: You need something that understands MIME-structured messages
and also understands how to display the different kinds of body
parts.

MH 6.8 supports displaying MIME body parts by using any combination of
programs that you tell it to use.  Examples:

        - The popular UNIX program xv can be used to display GIF image
          parts with the X Window System.

        - GhostScript (aka "gs") can be used to display PostScript
          body parts with the X Window System.  On systems running
          SunOS, "pageview" may be used instead.  Or the body part can
          simply be "lpr"-ed to a PostScript printer.


Q 4.2: What's this "richtext" thing?

A 4.2: Richtext is a very simple markup language (a la nroff, Scribe, or
TeX, except *way* simpler) that you can use in MIME messages.
Richtext allows you to specify attributes such as boldface, italics,
underlining, indentation, justification, and centering, among others.

Richtext is a part of RFC 1341, the MIME specification, starting on
page 23.

A richtext body part can be converted into plain text---there's an
example C program to do just that in RFC 1341---or it can be displayed
with all the bells and whistles on a terminal with the various types
of character attributes.  How the richtext attributes may be displayed
varies wildly, so it's best to be conservative in using richtext
attributes.

- Q 4.3: What about security issues?

A 4.3: As an end user or as a system administrator, it DEFINITELY pays to
know and to understand the security considerations of MIME.  It's
possible, for example, for someone to encode a MIME message to do evil
things to an unwary mail user.  PostScript is a big potential security
hole.  One famous example is the "melting screen" PostScript program,
which destroys screens maintained by Display PostScript
implementations.  For another example, PostScript can be used to
change the password on some PostScript printers with previously
undefined passwords, which denies the use of the printer until the
printer's password can (somehow) be changed back.  Yet other Display
PostScript implementations may allow file operations. (NeXTstep wisely
disables file operations.)

The enumeration of these security holes is not to be interpreted as
encouragement to exploit the holes.  They are mentioned only because
they are well known.  Refer to books such as "Practical UNIX Security"
and to news groups such as comp.security.misc for general information
about system security.


Q 4.4: What about a group 3 facsimile encoding?

A 4.4: It is rumored that there was an attempt to include G3 FAX in
the current MIME standard, but that it was impossible for the authors
of the MIME specification to gain a consensus on how to encode the
data.  So G3 FAX has been left for a future MIME implementation.  But
you can always define your own body part.


Q 4.5: Should I always use external body parts to save space?

A 4.5: Not necessarily.  In many cases, for example, at the ends of
UUCP connections, your recipients may not be able to retrieve external
body parts easily.  It depends on your audience.  Making files
available via a mail server is to be encouraged.  It is always
possible to provide MIME alternative parts that first offer FTP, then
mail server options.


Q 4.6: What mail servers are best to use when advertising files via
MIME external body parts?

A 4.6: There are various mail servers available.  Check news.answers
for the FAQ about mail server software.  We do not presently have a
recommendation.

5. Free MIME software packages.

5.1 metamail

Metamail: Author N. Borenstein
[This section in part from the comp.mail.misc faq]

    [Described by Paul Eggert, [e-mail]]

    Metamail is a software implementation of Mime, designed for easy
    integration with traditional mail-reading interfaces -- typically,
    users do not invoke metamail directly.  Ideally, extending the local
    email or news system to handle a new media format is a simple matter
    of adding a line to a mailcap file.  Mailcap files are described in
    RFC 1343: N Borenstein, ``A user agent configuration mechanism for
    multimedia mail format information'' (June 1992).  The source code
    for metamail can be found in ftp.uu.net:mail/metamail/mm.tar.Z.
    To join its mailing list, write [e-mail].

    The metamail package is available via anonymous FTP as follows:

         host    thumper.bellcore.com
         dir     pub/nsb/

    The current release is 2.4, as of 27 Dec 1992, includes:

    mm.2.4.tar.Z -- the metamail distribution that NSB supports.
    contrib2.4.tar.Z -- contributed sources
    amiga2.4.tar -- Amiga binaries & utilities
    dos2.4.tar.Z -- DOS binaries (still one version downlevel)


5.2 MIXMH

From: [e-mail] (Harald Tveit Alvestrand)
Newsgroups: comp.mail.mime,comp.mail.mh
Subject: MIXMH: A version of XMH that supports MIME
Date: 10 Dec 92 14:52:39 GMT
Reply-To: [e-mail]

MIXMH version 0.2, a version of XMH that supports some MIME features,
is available for anonymous FTP from aun.uninett.no

Host: aun.uninett.no
Directory: pub/unix
Filename: mixmh-0.2.tar.Z

This version is based on XMH version 1.6 from SEI, Carnegie Mellon.
It supports sending MIME with extended character sets in the headers
(per RFC-1342) and the body (per RFC-1341 text/plain).
It has limited support for multipart messages.

The source is freely redistributable and modifyable.

As you can see from the version number, it is still not considered
fully stable. Bugs may be reported to [e-mail]
Information and discussion will take place on [e-mail];
mail to [e-mail] to join.

--
                   Harald Tveit Alvestrand
[e-mail]
C=no;PRMD=uninett;O=sintef;OU=delab;S=alvestrand;G=harald
[phone]

5.3 MH 6.8 and 'mhn'

From: [e-mail] (John Romine)
Subject: MH 6.8 release now available
Date: 15 Dec 92 22:42:45 GMT
To: [e-mail]

    I'm pleased to announce a new release of the UCI version of
    the RAND MH Message Handling System.  The current release is

      MH 6.8

    Here are the details:

    - MH is in the public-domain
    - MH runs on a number of versions of UNIX (4.[123]BSD, V7,
      SYS5, and related variants, e.g., SVR4, HPUX)
    - MH runs on top of a number of mail transport systems
      (MMDF-{I,II}, SendMail, stand-alone (with UUCP support))

    Although MH is not "supported" per se, it does have a
    bug-reporting address, [e-mail] (ucbvax!ucivax!bug-mh).
    Bug reports (and fixes) are welcome, by the way.  There are also
    two Internet discussion groups:  [e-mail] and
    [e-mail].  MH-Users is bi-directionally gatewayed
    to USENET as comp.mail.mh.

CHANGES IN THIS RELEASE

    There are quite a few changes in this release.  Of particular
    note:  MH can now handle multi-media (MIME) messages.  I will
    post the entire MH changes document separately.

HOW TO GET MH

    There are two ways to get the latest release:

    1.  If you can FTP to the ARPA Internet, use anonymous FTP
    to ftp.ics.uci.edu [128.195.1.1] and retrieve the file
    pub/mh/mh-6.8.tar.Z.  This is a tar image after being run
    through the compress program (approximately 1.8MB).  There
    should also be a README file in that directory which tells
    what the current release of MH is, and how to get updates.

    This tar file is also available on louie.udel.edu
    [128.175.1.3] in portal/mh-6.8.tar.Z.  You may also find MH
    on various other hosts; to make sure you get the latest ver-
    sion and don't waste your time re-fixing bugs, it's best to
    get it from either ftp.ics.uci.edu or louie.udel.edu.

    The usual FTP mirror sites (uunet, etc.) should have MH 6.8
    available within a few days.

    2.  You can send $75 US to the address below.  This covers
    the cost of a 6250 BPI 9-track magtape, handling, and ship-
    ping.  In addition, you'll get a laser-printed hard-copy of
    the entire MH documentation set.  Be sure to include your
    USPS address with your check.  Checks must be drawn on U.S.
    funds and should be made payable to:

       Regents of the University of California

    The distribution address is:

       Univeristy of California at Irvine
       Office of Academic Computing
       360 Computer Science
       Irvine, CA  92717  USA

       [phone]

    Sadly, if you just want the hard-copies of the documenta-
    tion, you still have to pay the $75.  The tar image has the
    documentation source (the manual is in roff format, but the
    rest are in TeX format).  Postscript formatted versions of
    the TeX papers are available, as are crude tty-conversions
    of those papers.

UPDATES

    The updates from MH 6.7.2 to MH 6.8 are quite large (about
    1.5Mb uncompressed).  I'm still considering how to make them
    available.  More details will follow

CORRESPONDENCE

    As always, please send any bug reports or comments about MH to
    the address "[e-mail]" (...ucbvax!ucivax!bug-mh).

/JLR

5.4 Pine

Pine: Authors Laurence Lundblade, Michael Seibel, and Mark Crispin
     <[e-mail]>
[This section from the comp.mail.misc faq]

    Pine is a mail user agent developed by the University of Washington Office
    of Computing and Communications. It has been designed for ease-of-use and
    with the novice computer user in mind. It is based on Internet mail
    protocols (e.g. RFC-822, SMTP, IMAP, and MIME) and currently runs on
    a variety of UNIX platforms and MS-DOS.

    The guiding principles for achieving ease-of-use in Pine were:
    careful limitation of features, one-character mnemonic commands,
    always-present command menus, immediate user feedback, and high
    tolerance for user mistakes. It is intended that Pine can be learned
    by exploration rather than reading manuals.

    A stand-alone version of Pico, Pine's message composition editor, is also
    available. It is a very simple and easy to use text editor with text
    justification and a spelling checker.

    Features:
       - Mail index showing a message summary which includes the status,
     sender, size, date and subject of messages.

       - View and process mail with the following commands:  forward, reply,
     save, export, print, delete, capture address and search.

       - Address book for saving long complex addresses and personal
     distribution lists under a nickname.

       - Multiple folders and folder management screen for filing messages.

       - Message composer with easy-to-use editor and spelling checker.
     The message composer also assists entering and formatting
     addresses and provides direct access to the address book.

       - Online help specific to each screen and context.

       - Supports access to remote mail repositories via the IMAP2 protocol
     defined in RFC-1176.

       - Support multi-part mail conforming to proposed MIME Internet
     standard, allowing sending of sounds, graphics such as GIF and TIFF
     files, and binary files such as spreadsheets.

    Pine, including source code, is freely available via anonymous FTP from
    ftp.cac.washington.edu on the Internet. Other provisions for distribution
    have not yet been made. From the Internet, you may try out Pine and leave
    comments by telneting to "demo.cac.washington.edu" and logging in as
    "pinedemo". To join the Pine mailing list for announcements send a
    request to "[e-mail]".

    Pine is very portable and runs on a variety of UNIX machines including
    DECstations, NeXTs, VAX's and Suns. Pine was originally based on Elm,
    but it has evolved much since, ("Pine Is No-longer Elm").  Pine uses the
    c-client library discussed below.

    For further information send e-mail to [e-mail]. Pine is
    the work of Mike Siebel, Mark Crispin, and Laurence Lundblade at the
    University of Washington.

5.5 c-client: Author Mark Crispin <[e-mail]>
[this section from the comp.mail.misc faq]

    Software writers only:

    c-client is a general library useful for creating MUA's.  It provides
    a Application Program Interface for retrieving and manipulating
    mail messages.  It supports the latest draft of MIME (proposed
    Internet standard for multipart, multimedia, typed electronic mail).
    It is driver based, and easily ported to new platforms and MTA's.
    The currently supported platforms include various versions of BSD and
    SysV Unix, DOS, Macintosh and even TOPS-20(!).  It supports mailboxes
    in /usr/spool/mail, mbox, mail.txt, mh, carmel format, as well as remote
    mailbox access via the IMAP2 protocol described in RFC-1176 and extended
    by the IMAP2bis extensions.

    c-client does not contain any user interface.  Rather, it contains
    everything else that goes into an MUA.  c-client is called with such
    functions as mail_open(), mail_fetchheader(), mail_setflag(), etc.

    Just the thing if you want to write a new MUA.

    Contact the author for more details.

5.6 Andrew

5.7 elm

From: [e-mail] (Syd Weinstein)
Date: Mon, 21 Dec 1992 18:31:31 -0500 (EST)

Elm support for MIME:
2.3 - uses metamail supplied patch from Nathan.

2.4:
    reading: detects MIME headers and calls metamail automatically
    if the message cannot be displayed on the current screen using
    the native capabilities of the display (recognizes some char
    sets as native)

    sending: detects [include ] markers and makes them MIME attachments.
    Still very 'crude', but its all we had time for, as to the
    release deadline of 'Elm' and MIME.

3.x:
    reading: probably no change from 2.x, but will understand
    some 'file storage' types and allow for splitting off attachments
    on their own.

    sending: will allow defining attachments to be added and auto build
    the MIME stuff, in addition to the [include ] syntax.

release status:
2.3:     obsolete
2.4:    Current PL is 17.
3.x:    not planned until some time in 1994.

--
========================================================================
Sydney S. Weinstein, CDP, CCP          Elm Coordinator - Current 2.4PL17
Datacomp Systems, Inc.                 Projected 3.0 Release: ??? ?,1994
[e-mail] or dsinc!syd      Voice: [phone], FAX: [phone]


5.8 PP
PP is an X.400 to SMTP gateway available from (xxx) (is there a PP
or ISODE FAQ?)

From: [e-mail] (Harald Tveit Alvestrand)
Subject: Re: X.400-SMTP Gateway
Reply-To: [e-mail]
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 92 13:22:37 GMT

The ISODE Consortium release of PP will in the near future
support gatewaying between MIME and X.400 according to the
MIME-MHS Internet-Drafts.
--
                   Harald Tveit Alvestrand
[e-mail]
C=no;PRMD=uninett;O=sintef;OU=delab;S=alvestrand;G=harald
[phone]

5.9 MIME tools for NeXT

From: [e-mail] (Dave Lacey)
To: [e-mail]
Subject: MIME FAQ
Reply-To: [e-mail]

Hi -
  I'd like to keep you apprised of some MIME work I'm doing.  I'm interested
in using MIME as a transport medium for multi-media gopher documents.  My
particular use is for Radiology info, but it would work for just about
anything.
  I've got a NeXT Gopher client almost working and I also have a NeXT based
MIME file editor that reads/creates MIME documents.  Both work, but need a
bit more extension.  I will likely distribute the source to this, so the MIME
reader (which is essentially an object) can be re-used in other apps.

5.10 Conversions from other mail systems
5.10.1 uuencode to MIME

Keith Moore posted

5.10.2 Sun OpenWindows mail to MIME
5.10.3 NeXTmail to MIME (n2m)

Newsgroups: comp.mail.mh
From: [e-mail] (David Collier-Brown)
Subject: Re: MH 6.8 to OpenWindows MultiMedia Mail?
Organization: York University
Date: Sat, 26 Dec 1992 22:35:00 GMT

[e-mail] (Dave Curry) writes:

|Has anyone come up with appropriate config file entries and/or supplemental
|programs to allow MH 6.8's "mhn" program to deal with the multimedia mail
|that Sun's OpenWindows 3.0 MailTool produces?  The headers all start with
|"X-Sun", e.g.:

An external program to convert it to MIME is easy...  I did one for
NeXT-to-MIME (n2m), and that's a fairly hard transformation.

I wonder if I should post it...  (I wonder if I did post it (:-()

--dave
--
David Collier-Brown,  | [e-mail] | lethe!dave
72 Abitibi Ave.,      |
Willowdale, Ontario,  | York Postmaster and
CANADA. 416-223-8968  | occasional sendfail(8) consultant.

5.11 MIME for VMS MAIL (HUyMailer)

From: [e-mail]
Newsgroups: comp.mail.mime
Subject: Re: MIME for VMS?
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 22 Dec 92 06:34:37 GMT
Organization: The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

>Is there any public domain package that does MIME for VMS MAIL?

I am working on adding it to my HUyMailer. I've started it but had to
abandon it for a while. I hope next month (which is also the next year,
eh?) I'll be able to cintinue working on it.
                                                      __Yehavi:
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Yehavi Bourvine (4X6DD),     Phones: [phone],     H
Computation Center,                          +5686      H
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem,  [phone]      H
Givat-Ram,  Jerusalem  91904                            H H H
                             Fax: [phone]         HH H
BITnet:    YEHAVI@HUJIVMS                               H   H
InterNet:  [e-mail]                       H
Israeli DECnet:  HUJICC::YEHAVI                       H
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=


(cover Amiga, other micro versions of same)
(mention Eudora et al)

6.  MIME information available from the Internet

6.1 Anonymous FTP

Information about FTPable stuff is scattered throughout this FAQ.
More specificatlly, look into the RFCs, mentioned in item 2.4.
Other goodies can be found in the MH and MetaMail source trees.

There is a collection of MIME sample messages on
thumper.bellcore.com:/pub/nsb which can be used to test implementations.

6.2 Mail-based archive servers
6.2.1 Eitech "ServiceMail"

Newsgroups: list.ietf-822
From: [e-mail] (Jay C. Weber)
Subject: the ServiceMail Toolkit (was: list of MIME implentations)
Date: Tue, 13 Oct 1992 19:52:12 GMT

We (Enterprise Integration Technologies Corporation) have a MIME
implementation, which we are distributing freely.  Instead of a MIME
MUA, it is a toolkit for building services that automatically process
MIME messages.  It is similar, in spirit, to the few other email-scripting
packages except:

  o it exploits several MIME features
  o it is intended to run standalone (as opposed to a back-end to a MUA)
  o it uses TCL (from Berkeley) as its scripting language

and support for PEM is in the works.

I've attached our blurb for ServiceMail v1.2, which includes instructions
on how to get the distribution (over email, of course).  The distribution
includes our "multimedia e-mail shell" (mesh) sources, the tcl 6.3 sources,
a small amount of metamail code, and many example service tcl sources.

I'd love to hear any comments this group has on the distribution's
ease of installation, bugs, usefullness, and MIME-compliance, and especially
any interesting services people create.  Here's hoping you find it
interesting and useful!

Jay
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Jay C. Weber                    [e-mail]
Enterprise Integration Technologies        [e-mail]
459 Hamilton Avenue, Suite #100            [phone]
Palo Alto, CA 94301


----------------------------------------------------------------------------
        The S E R V I C E M A I L (TM) T O O L K I T
                is now available
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Enterprise Integration Technologies Corporation is now providing
the ServiceMail(tm) Tool kit v1.2 for wide distribution and use.


What is ServiceMail(tm)?
------------------------
The name is a trademark of EIT.  The idea is that of sending email
to programs in order to request some automated or semi-automated
service.  There have been several applications along this line
accessible through electronic mail, including:

  LISTSERV (for mailing-list manipulation)
  MOSIS (for semiconductor fabrication brokering)
  FAST (for semiconductor parts brokering)
  ARCHIE (for archive searches, also with telnet, client/server interfaces)
  IJCAI-93 conference information
  FTP-by-email gateways
  many mail-servers, e.g., for CFI documents

Each of these applications use electronic mail in the following way:
users send their requests in the headers and/or bodies of email
messages, including any relevant data files (e.g., a semiconductor
layout representation).  These applications have been very popular,
partly or largely because of two key advantages provided by the email
approach to user interaction:

  o through gateways, email reaches millions of users who would not
    otherwise be able to access these services. This includes users on
    USENET, MCI Mail, Compuserve, etc.

  o email access is exceptionally simple, using existing and familiar
    email interfaces.

We believe that the combined successes of the above listed applications
have only barely tapped the potential of ServiceMail.  It's not the
answer to every networking application, of course, but we think there
are LOTS of applications where ServiceMail is a flexible and practical
approach to information exchange.  We have experimented with several
new applications of ServiceMail, including:

  o a stock-quote service

  o a LaTeX-to-Postscript formatting service

  o a TIFF image to text OCR service (written by Jim Davis at Cornell)

  o a semiconductor fabrication process simulator service at Stanford

  o a mechanical part checkplot/milling service at the Univ. of Utah

  o a knowledge-transport mechanism for the Palo Alto Collaborative
    [Engineering] Testbed

  o a CIM information service at Stanford/EIT

In addition, we have used ServiceMail to implement a variety of
popular services:

  o an FTP-by-email service

  o a WAIS-by-email service (enchanced by Jim Davis at Cornell)

  o an email postscript printing service

  o a mailing-list maintenance service (backwardly compatible with
    LISTSERV for major commands)

  o a finger-by-email service

Each of these involved only a few hours of programming, and are
supplied as examples in the ServiceMail distribution.


What is the ServiceMail(tm) Tool kit?
------------------------------------

EIT's approach to fostering ServiceMail is to freely distribute a
toolkit that helps service providers get their services on-line.
The current toolkit provides software to take care of the "overhead"
of ServiceMail services, including:

  o connecting to the email system

  o parsing incoming messages

  o multiplexing multiple services under a single mail address

  o generating outgoing messages

  o fielding basic services like "help" and "man"

Plus, ongoing work by EIT and others (principally, Purdue and NIST)
is addressing other generic ServiceMail issues for future tool kits:

  o authentication of users, integrity checks on message contents

  o auditing of service requests, responses

  o directory services, service advertisements

  o balancing server loads

Once the tool kit is installed, programming a new service can take
as little as a few minutes.


What is Mesh?
-------------

Mesh is the "Multimedia E-mail SHell" program, the main component of the
current tool kit.  Mesh runs on UNIX systems (it has been tested on
SunOS and Ultrix) and parses an incoming mail message, identifies the
service being requested, and invokes the implementation of that service.
Service implementations are written in an embedded programming language
called Tcl, from the package created at Berkeley.  Tcl has been
described as "a cross between C, LISP, and UNIX shell languages"; it
supports list processing, string processing, procedural control
constructs, and UNIX command execution.  Code and documentation for
Tcl is distributed with the tool kit.


What's the multimedia bit?
--------------------------

Unlike the few other automatic email-processing packages, mesh is
based on MIME, the new Internet "standard" for multimedia message
bodies.  MIME supplies new email constructs for the following capabilities:

  o large message fragmentation and re-assembly

  o non-ascii/long-line message content encodings

  o multipart message bundling

  o mainstream multimedia content labeling (images, audio, richtext, etc.)

  o special-purpose content labeling (PDES, LaTeX, KQML, etc.)

Using MIME, Mesh can handle idiosyncratic mail transport, special handling
of multimedia content types, and bundling of multiple input/output objects
to/from services.  However, since ordinary email is a special case of MIME
format, Mesh can handle messages generated by ordinary mail composers.

MIME opens up a slew of powerful and convenient service applications, so
we strongly suggest that you update your mail readers to handle MIME
format.  The principal way of doing this is to install the METAMAIL package
from Bellcore (freely obtained by anonymous FTP from thumper.bellcore.com).


How does one get the ServiceMail toolkit?
-----------------------------------------

EIT is providing ServiceMail access to the ServiceMail toolkit.  If you
have the METAMAIL or some other MIME-compliant mail reader, just send the
message

  To: [e-mail]
  Subject: archive-request servicemail.tar.Z

  and read the response(s) using METAMAIL.  Save the result in
  servicemail.tar.Z

If you don't have a MIME reader, send the message

  To: [e-mail]
  Subject: archive-request servicemail.sh

  and do the following to the multi-message response:

  1) strip the headers off the messages, combine the bodies
  2) delete all instances of "=" and a subsequent newline
  3) replace all instances of "=3D" with "="
  4) replace all instances of "=2E" with "."

  you can perform 3 & 4 with the following UNIX commands:

    % mv servicemail.sh tmpfile
    % sed s/=3D/=/g|sed s/=2E/./g < tmpfile > servicemail.sh

  Sorry, but the difficulty in transporting large, complex files was
  one of the motivations for MIME.  If this is really inconvenient,
  and your system supports ftp, you can get servicemail.tar.Z by
  anonymous ftp from eitech.com.


How does one install the toolkit?
----------------------------------

The tool kit assumes that there is a UNIX account dedicated to ServiceMail
(there are a number of reasons for this, though it is possible to install
it otherwise).  We recommend calling this account "services".  Get this
account created, login under that account, and copy servicemail.tar.Z (or
servicemail.sh) to the account's home directory.  For servicemail.tar.Z,
issue the commands

  % uncompress servicemail.tar.Z
  % tar xvf servicemail.tar

or for servicemail.sh, issue the command

  % sh servicemail.sh

in either case, you will then have the toolkit directory structure.
Read the README file(s), and then type 'make'.  Mesh will then be
on-line, and you can start turning on example services and writing
your own.

If you have any problems with acquisition, installation, or use, don't
hesitate to send mail to "[e-mail]" and ask for help.

IF YOU WANT FUTURE UPDATES ON TOOL KIT VERSIONS, BUGS, AND SERVICES,
MAKE SURE YOU ARE ON THE PACT-KIT MAILING LIST.  To get on it, send
a message to "[e-mail]" with subject
"listserv subscribe pact-kit your-real-name".


6.3 WAIS

6.4 Gopher

6.5 MIME CD-ROM

7. Commercial MIME software packages and published books and article.s

List of commercial products with released or announced support for
MIME, also published books or articles that cover MIME.

7.1 books and periodicals

7.1.1 _The Internet Message_, Marshall Rose

@book{Message.Book,
    author    =    mtr,
    title    =    "{The Internet Message: Closing the Book with
              Electronic Mail}",
    publisher=    {Prentice-Hall},
    address    =    {Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey},
    series    =    {Prentice Hall Series in Innovative Computing},
    year    =    1992,
    note    =    {ISBN 0--13--092941--7}
}

7.1.2
From: [e-mail] (Alec Henderson)
Newsgroups: comp.protocols.tcp-ip
Subject: Re: Need MIME Information
Date: 18 Dec 92 20:32:53 GMT

[...]

2.  There is a good introductory article on MIME in the September
    1992 issue of Connexions; also several other interesting articles
    on e-mail, both MIME and X.400.  (Ole Jacobsen, the Connexions
    editor, was kind enough to send me a copy of the September issue.)

7.2 Commercial MIME software

7.2.1 IBM multimedia mail for OS/2

From: [e-mail] (Larry Salomon Jr.)
Date: 10 Dec 92 13:55:50 GMT
Subject: IBM Developing Multimedia Mail
Newsgroups: comp.mail.mime

I'm not going to follow this group, but I wanted to state that IBM - at
the T.J. Watson Research Center - is developing a multimedia mail application
for OS/2 which is based on the Mime spec.  The demoed it at Interop.

For more information, including (probably) how to become a test site (I
haven't confirmed whether they're actually going to do this, but they've
done it before), contact the department manager, Jerry Cuomo, at
[e-mail]

7.2.2 Innosoft PMDF for VMS

The VMSNET newsgroup 'vmsnet.mail.pmdf' is available for discussion.

From: Ned Freed <[e-mail]>

Send technical inquiries to [e-mail]. Product information/pricing/
literature can be obtained from [e-mail]. The phone number
is [phone]; FAX is [phone]. Street address is:

    Innosoft International, Inc.
    250 W. First St., Suite 240
    Claremont, CA 91711

7.2.3 Control Data Systems Mail*Hub package

From: [e-mail]
Date: Wed, 23 Dec 92 13:07:14 PST

Regarding your MIME FAQ. Attached is some information to
update section 7 on commercial MIME software packages.

 - Control Data Systems Mail*Hub package

Mail*Hub includes support for X.400, X.500, SMTP, and creating,
viewing, sending MIME enclosures in mail. In additon, the Fax Gateway
portion of Mail*Hub supports sending mail with MIME enclosures to a
Fax machine.  Graphical MIME components (Postscript, GIF, TIFF,...)
are automatically recognized and imaged at the receiving Fax machine.
The product is shipping now and is currently available on Control Data
4000 Series Mips-based Unix systems. For more information contact
[e-mail]

7.2.4 CCMAIL support for MIME

Date: Wed, 16 Dec 92 11:26:18 pst
From: [e-mail]
To: Edward Vielmetti <[e-mail]>

Because this version (2.1) is a 2-3 QTR-93 release you should
be talking to your sales rep about the tentative features of this
product. They can be reached at 800-448-2500.

thanks,   Byron-Tech Support

- Z-Code Z-Mail (ready now?)
- MIME relays for MSMAIL, etc?
- others?

8. MIME based relays for commercial e-mail services

8.1 Large national or international providers

(send mail to postmasters at each system asking?)
- America On-line?
- ATTMAIL ?
- Compuserve ?
- Dialog ?
- Genie ?
- MCI Mail?
- Radiomail ?
- Sprintmail ?

(should coordinate this with the global e-mail list that is posted to
comp.mail.misc)

8.2 Local or regional providers

(should coordinate this with e.g. the PDIAL list)

9.  Acknowlegements

[e-mail] (Paul Eggert)    [2.4]
[e-mail] (Marshall Rose)    [2.4], [7.1.1]
[e-mail] (Jerry Sweet)         [2.1] [2.2] [2.3 (part)] [3.1]
                                        [4.1-4.6] [5.1]
comp.mail.misc FAQ            [5.1]
[e-mail] (Mark Crispin)        [5.4] [5.5]
[e-mail] (Syd Weinstein)    [5.7]
[e-mail] (David Collier-Brown) [5.10.3]
[e-mail]            [5.11]
[e-mail] (Larry Salomon Jr.)    [7.2.1]
[e-mail] (Ned Freed)        [7.2.2]
[e-mail] (Rich Ragan)    [7.2.3]
[e-mail] (CC:Mail support)    [7.2.4]

This is a second pass at such a list, I hope that it
gets filled in with great details as time passes, but you have to
start somewhere.

  Edward Vielmetti, vice president for research, Msen Inc. [e-mail]
        Msen Inc., 628 Brooks, Ann Arbor MI  48103 +1 313 998 GLOB