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November 1996, Week 3

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Subject:
A MIME is a terrible thing to waste :-)
From:
Jeff Kell <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Jeff Kell <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Fri, 15 Nov 1996 14:51:22 -0500
Content-Type:
text/plain
Parts/Attachments:
text/plain (56 lines) 
Note to hp3000-l/comp.sys.hp.mpe readers:  if your site doesn't use
HP sendmail, Worldtalk, or you didn't receive a blank message from
the list with subject "Re: Detecting TurboImage TPI's" from
[log in to unmask] you might want to skip this message.
Otherwise, it might be of interest, particularly to system/network
administrators.

Martin's message was sent in MIME format and contained a strange
MIME boundary:
boundary="----
=_0_MIME_Boundary_21967.328ca51c.imtvhj30.dcuh029.dcu.ps.net"

In case your mailer didn't show that, that is four dashes, space,
"=_0_(etc)".  An embedded space, in other words.  The mailer was
identfied in the headers as:

X-Mailer:  Worldtalk (4.0.2-p6)/MIME

Listserv "folded" this line at the embedded space, yielding the full
MIME header line of:

Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="----

=_0_MIME_Boundary_21967.328ca51c.imtvhj30.dcuh029.dcu.ps.net"

I read the message with Netscape 3.0 Gold, and I got a blank message
body (headers, no text) but using View...Source I could see the text.
Some of you may have seen the same thing.  Some of you, however, never
got the message in the first place, as I received over a dozen bounces
from various places indicating a fatal SMTP error code 553:

553 header syntax error, line "
=_0_MIME_Boundary_21967.328ca51c.imtvhj30.dcuh029.dcu.ps.net"": No such
file or directory

I checked each and every one of the bounced sites and found that
all of them were running HP sendmail of various versions, some of
which were:

   (1.39.109.11/15.6)
   (1.39.111.2/16.2)
   (1.40.112.8/16.2.3)

I recall a similar instance earlier, but I *think* that the boundary
text wasn't delimited by quotes (I could be wrong), and I got lots of
mail bounces.  The only other "fatal" MIME error I've seen was an
older version of NetMail that died on a boundary header that had no
closing quote.

I don't know if Listserv, Worldtalk, Netscape, or HP Sendmail is
broken/non-conforming/whatever, but I thought those of you affected
might want to be aware of the problem.  And I have no idea how many
other mailers/mail readers may have been affected.

Jeff Kell <[log in to unmask]>

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