On 5/8/2012 9:42 AM, John Shear wrote:
I use Thunderbird on Linux to read mail and newsgroups. That's as open
and standard as it gets. But I can't decipher the yenc format. Heck, I
hadn't even heard of it til now. Do I need a plugin or something?
Helpful advice would go a lot further in getting us to support your
format than sarcasm will.

John S.

On 05/07/2012 05:27 PM, Darian wrote:
On Mon, 7 May 2012 06:24:53 -0700,
wrote:

Too bad, cannot see this file picture.
try a jpeg.
yenc.

"Joe" wrote in message ...

jibberish removed...)

The answer is really this...in most situations today, it is simply a
matter of personal preference. If you want to fully enjoy yENC objects
then you will need a multi-part solution for various readers like
Mozilla's Thunderbird, Outlook, etc.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YEnc

While not exactly 100% correct, Wikipedia does simplify the arguments
here and further, provides a limited historical perspective.

What drives the majority of uunet users today is the simplicity and
convenience of web (html) based interfaces to uunet news vs original
text based (ASCII 7 or 8 bit) interface, once popular with early BBS and
Usenet readers. Of course also in many cases today the host is throwing
adds in your face and tracking every move you make at the same time. :-)

POP3 and ASCII are still preferred means of interfacing with uunet and,
BTW, far less susceptible to malware or viruses than scripted html or
binary based traffic. On the other hand, most of what one sees these
days is simply a relay of conventional gmail or other commercial user
group, as opposed to true uunet; check headers of posts for originating
hosts.

Moving along,

The Original intent of yENC was to reduce the horrendous amount of
overhead required to support binary files in days when bandwidth was
largely limited by dial-up speeds. Some here, tend to forget that huge
files took a very long time to download and decode over standard voice
grade dial-up and, almost nobody allowed native binaries due to limited
server storage, timely delivery, and available bandwidths. I can even
remember when 300 baud was a HUGE breakthrough!

Keep in mind also that while one can compress a text file into a very
small space, most digital photos are already compressed and further
efforts generally result in artifacts and/ or significant loss of detail
-- uh oh, betcha I hear more about that statement from more than a few
self professed experts herein. :-)

Today, there are still news sites & forums in existence that do not
allow native binaries for the same reasons as cited above, many of which
are actually hosted from privately owned PCs, located in someone's
basement and running open source Apache, BSD, or other free solutions.

So, there are still many very good & appropriate uses for yENC (1 - 2%
overhead and very fast vs. binary at 40% or more), even now in today's
Google groups.

Frankly, and at great risk of being severely slash/...dotted, I
personally have no problem with either binary or yENC and further
maintain that this entire argument simply boils down to preference. Some
people like Ford and others prefer Chevrolet, and both will likely get
you to where you want to go.

If you want to view yENC formats, then by all means obtain a 3rd party
solution, or not. Is it required? Nope...especially if your whole life
is devoted only to this particular group. :-)

If you wish, go ahead and experiment with yENC'd photos and do your own
math. The difference in download speed and file size will become
immediately obvious, but, these days, the majority simply do not concern
themselves with such trivial matters as bandwidth or speed, and seem far
more concerned with being severely critical of everyone that does.

--
Digger
Bob O'Dell