[H-GEN] using telnet

[Christopher Biggs]

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David Jericho <david.jericho at bytecomm.com.au> moved upon the face of the 'Net and spake thusly:

> Sometimes sending 8 bit data over a telnet connection can do funny
> things, so the use of uuencode(1) or mimencode(1) will turn it a
> base64 encoded stream.

Back in the Elder Days, I once downloaded an entire release of
Slackware using uuencode and cat[1], because I had an almost
error-free modem connection, but the ISP system (remember shell
dialups?)  had no working file-transfer programs.  I think I only had
corruption (warranting only re-try for that file) in 2 out of 30-odd
floppy images.

But really, the gold plated solution here is Kermit!  Kermit is God's
File Transfer Protocol.  It copes with most forms of non-cleanness,
and although it has a reputation for high overhead, can be very
efficient if you tune the blocking parameters slightly.

--cjb

[1] Before the "cat-is-evil" jihad commences: Why cat?  Because I
    uuencoded all the files on disk, then took their individual
    checksums, used cat to join-and-print all the uuencoded files,
    saved the result using capture-to-disk facility of my terminal
    program), then split the captured data back into separate files
    (using sed, or even vi), and finally compared the checksums of the
    downloaded files to the originals.



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