[Mailman-Users] Trouble Sending Attachments to MailMan Lists withEudora 6

[Mark Sapiro]

Dave Bacon wrote:
>
>Sending messages with binary attachments 
>(like Excel files) to MailMan lists with Eudora 6 seems to be 
>problematic.  The problem does not occur in testing with Netscape or 
>Mozilla email clients.  Many of our list subscribers stated that the 
>attachment had become part of the text message as a large random table 
>of text.  Here is a sample of the problem:
>
>--=====================_209060==_
>Content-Type: application/octet-stream; name="filename.xls";
>	x-mac-type="584C5334"; x-mac-creator="5843454C"
>Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64
>Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="filename.xls"
>
>0M8R4KGxGuEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAPgADAP7/CQAGAAAAAAAAAAAAAAABAAAAHgAAAAAAAAAA
>EAAA/v///wAAAAD+////AAAAAB0AAAD/////////////////////////////////////////////
>////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
<snip>

This is exactly what a MIME base64 encoded attachment looks like in a
raw message. The question is - is it being seen this way because the
recipient's MUA doesn't recognize the MIME format or because the
overall MIME structure of the message has been corrupted somewhere
along the way. Whether or not the MIME structure is corrupted cannot
be answered from your excerpt. You'd have to see the entire raw
message including the main headers and the sub-part headers to
determine that. However, if SOME list subscribers see the attachment
as an attachment, and they're not all using the same broken MUA, then
the problem is likely in the MUA's of the people who don't see the
attachment as such.

OTOH, if all or almost all recipients see the raw base64 part as above,
then the structure of the message is probably being corrupted and
Mailman may or may not be involved in this. The fact that it only
happens with messages from Eudora 6 might implicate Eudora, but it's
hard to say. I just tested sending a message with an attached binary
file from Eudora 5.2 through Mailman 2.1.4 and the attachment came
through as it should.

--
Mark Sapiro <msapiro at value.net>       The highway is for gamblers,
San Francisco Bay Area, California    better use your sense - B. Dylan