From: notsaying@nospicedham.invalid.org   
      
   Martin Str|mberg  wrote in news:okhr07$1nbe   
   $1@gioia.aioe.org:   
      
   > wolfgang kern  wrote:   
   >> Mike Gonta started the story which we (Kerr and me) took on:   
   >   
   >> I remember Herbert Kleebauer once show us a way to transfer binaries   
   >> by text-only (sorry for I don't remember the details).   
   >   
   >> but now we seem to be restricted to Terje's demand which disallow   
   >> quote-marks and characters outside of the Base64 defined range.   
   >   
   >> Why ? All standard internet protocols can use 0x20..0x7e and also   
   >> allow (by 8bit ASCII extension) all local chars required from 0x80..   
   >   
   > I haven't had time to follow the decoding threads so perhaps I'm   
   > missing something.   
   >   
   > _I_ didn't limit me to only base64 characters. Because as I wanted my   
   > program to run on a 8086 and as there is no popa, I had to use pop %bx   
   > and friends. Otherwise mission impossible.   
   >   
   I think you're right.   
      
   My efforts were/are based on smaller size starting from Terje's code.   
   Then I decided the whole decoder should be B64 only (otherwise how does   
   the recepient know if the header-decoder is good?   
      
   > If you can show us a way to get an offset without pop %bx, %bp, %si,   
   > or %di into one(all?) of these registers (8086 code, .COM text file,   
   > base64), I'd be grateful. Currently we seem to think it's impossible.   
   >   
   >   
   > As to why the self-commited limit, no reason. You just decide on the   
   > rules and hack away. Obviously Terje and Kerr(?) decided they wanted   
   > those rules.   
      
   I was following Terje's requirements as best I could (though I'm OK with   
   more fixups).   
      
   > I wanted my 8086 rule. You can decide to follow other   
   > rules. It was just a fun and challenging exercise.   
   >   
      
   Of course.   
   >   
   >> So our current 209 Byte decode + Hello World can be reduced by many   
   >> bytes if we ignore this restrictions and just use what all standard   
   >> gateways will support.   
   >   
   > The mail things of old were easy to break as some parts only supported   
   > this and other parts only supported that. Now (probably) the odd   
   > computers and routers and whatever have been replaced and the new ones   
   > are more compatible.   
   >   
   > So you decide the rules and tell and show us (if you want).   
   >   
   >   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)