Re: Commented search routine

[mike.k-mac@xxxxxxxx]

Freeware base64 decoders are easy to come by. If all else fails, search Yahoo! ≪ True--but it bears remembering that not everyone who has an Internetable E- mail address has that kind of net (or Web) access. (Thanks to a hard-disk crash on my primary system, I myself can barely get to CompuServe and Genie at the moment.) ≫But I don't understand the bias against uuencoding around here... ≪ Your second point is a significant one. In my experience, UUencoding is as much an everyday standard for Internet file transmission as, say, ZIP is for PC file compression. It's not the _only_ format, nor even necessarily the best--but it's overwhelmingly the most popular and most universally accessible. Posting in Base64 is comparable to uploading in ZOO or PAK format--it effectively limits access to whatever it is the poster is contributing. (Adequate proof of that can be found on just about any alt.binaries.* group, where the posting of something in Base64 regularly and inevitably leads to a flurry of posts either complaining or requesting a repost in UUCODE.) I suspect that AOL's software chokes on Base64 files; I know that the popular offline reader OZWIN2 for CompuServe has built-in UUdecoding, but no Base64 capability; I believe the same is true for the very popular Internet newsreader FREE AGENT. Best, Michael ---] Michael Paul McDowell, writing as Michael P. Kube-McDowell [--- ---] Author of EMPRISE, ALTERNITIES, THE QUIET POOLS, and EXILE [--- ---] For more info: http://www.greyware.com/authors/K-Mac [---