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1995-03-31
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UUdeview Readme
***************
The Problem
===========
You can't post (or email) binary files to newsgroups as binary files,
since binary files contain lots of unprintable characters. Therefore,
files must be coded into printable characters. There are a couple of
methods available, like the macintosh binhex. The most popular
encoding method is uuencoding, which first became standard in the
unix world.
Unfortunately, there is another limitation to mailing or
news-posting coded programs, since many mail or news gateways
have an upper file size limit. Therefore, files must also be split into
multiple parts to allow these gateways to handle them.
But the standard decoder programs aren't built to handle this. They
can only work unsplit files. Concatenating the individual
mails/postings does not help, since they contain lots of headers that
confuse the decoder. The only help is to manually delete the headers
from the mails/postings with a text editor. And, some of the bigger
files come in more than 50 parts. You don't want to sit down and
edit 50 files only to see a single animation, do you?
And still we're not through yet. Although the files are usually
posted in the right order, they don't necessarily arrive correctly
ordered. So you must also manually put them in order.
I hope I have you convinced by now that you do not want to have to
do this stuff. By now, you should think "Well, there must be
something to simplify decoding". And you're right. This is where
UUdeview steps in.
The Idea
========
The Idea was to create a program that does all the work for you.
You should not have to manually strip headers, and you shouldn't be
troubled by the order of the files. And, the program should be able
to process multiple files at once.
Now combine all this with a simple and friendly user-interface, and
you have UUdeview!
Featuring ...
=============
Some of the highlights include:
o Shoot'em'up interface. You fire up the program will all
input files on the command line, and uudeview will then
present you all decodeable files.
o Basically is a smart multi-file multi-part decoder, but also
feels at home dumbly with single-file single-part input.
o Features the encoding schemes "UUencode", "XXencode"
and "Base64" (aka MIME); these schemes are auto-detected
for each email/article.
o Ports exist for Unix, DOS and Windows, so if you
frequently change your operating system, UUdeview will
migrate with you.
o The unique SPMS(r) technology sometimes allows to
recover from errors in the original postings' subject line. If
you have parts 1,2 and 4 of 'test' and part 3 of 'toast', the
program will try to guess these parts belong together.
o The Unix and DOS versions allow file previews without
decoding the file (well, in fact it is decoded, but you won't
notice)
o Usually asks before decoding each file, but can as well be
configured for batch-decoding.
o The Windows version includes the UUdeview Launcher,
allowing for drag-and-drop decoding, and selection of
options by mouseclick
The Philosophy
==============
UUdeview's philosophy is "to work". Thus it is programmed for to
be smart and will decode files that other programs don't, or decode
incorrectly. On the other hand, it is not designed for maximum
fanciness; compared to other decoders it may look anachronistic.
But you can decide on your own whether you want maximum
operatability or maximum fanciness. And then there is another
feature in favour of UUdeview, distinguishing it from other,
similar utilities: It is free. I have found that most other decoders fit
into one of two categories. Either they are not too bright (most get
confused by parts that are not ordered), or they are not free.
Behind the Frontend
===================
UUdeview evaluates the 'subject:' line. From the subject line, it tries
to derive the name of the file and the part number. It looks for a
filename of the kind string.suffix (also accepting more than one
suffix). This file name must then appear on all subject lines
containing other parts from this file (if it doesn't, hope for SPMS).
If there's nothing on the subject that looks like a file name, don't
worry, then UUdeview will find something else. And this
subject-line file name isn't used for anything else than subject-line
matching, anyway. For the actual file, the filename from the 'begin'
line is used.
The program is also quite tolerant with part numbers. First, it looks
for numbers in brackets (16/22) or (16 of 22) or simply (16).
Secondly, it looks for the same kind of information in square
brackets. Then it looks for the string "Part 16" or "Part #16" or
something similar. As long as there actually is a part number,
chances are that it will be found.
Will there ever be a version 1.0?
=================================
UUdeview was originally developed for Unix only, and it was
planned to feature a full-screen curses menu-driven interface. Then
I thought about it some more, discovered the above philosophy and
found it not necessary for a program such simple to have a
bombastic interface -- which would only make it more
incompatible. Because this interface was planned for 1.0, and I have
now decided not to include such an interface, it is unlikely that there
will ever be version 1.0. But hey, the version is only a number that
really doesn't tell anything.
Known Bugs
==========
o UUdeview only accepts Base64 (MIME) data that has a line
length of a multiple of four. The MIME standard does not
enforce a particular length. So far, no file with a
non-multiple-of-four line length has been found.
o In its desperate attempts to merge file parts, SPMS might
infrequently produce a junk file (consisting partially of an
AU file and partially of an MPEG, for example). Again, this
has yet to happen to me.
File_id.diz
===========
Personally, I do hate these files. They are always the first one to
suffer from a massive del attack after unpacking any archive. But
upon request, here's mine:
----
(version 0.4) powerful multi-file multi-part
decoder for uuencoded, xxencoded, and Base64
(MIME) encoded data. Works with news postings
as well as emailed data. Free but copyrighted
(GPL).
WWW home at http://www.uni-frankfurt.de/~fp/
Frank Pilhofer fp@informatik.uni-frankfurt.de
----
Famous last words
=================
Although the program is free, donations are always gladly accepted
<grin>, be it postcards, email, hardware or anything else. I will
conquer the last step in the evolution of UUdeview, the Macintosh
port, as soon as someone donates me a Mac.
For you lawyers out there:
Unix is a registered trademark of AT&T.
Windows is a registered trademark of Microsoft.
Macintosh is a registered trademark of Apple.
UUdeview and SPMS are unregistered trademarks of Frank Pilhofer
Projects (FPP)
Frank Pilhofer <fp@informatik.uni-frankfurt.de> Back to the
Homepage
Last modified: Tue Feb 14 09:18:28 1995