Re: MIME (again)

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----



On Wed, 14 Dec 1994, L. McCarthy wrote:

> I'm using a version of ELM which claims to be MIME-compliant and usually is,
> but all I saw in Peter Cassidy's message was a collection of random-looking
> extended-ASCII characters. Usually when something arrives in a locally-
> unsupported MIME format (like Amanda's GIF a while back), I just get an
> "unrecognized format" error message. I didn't see any error messages at all
> this time, just a meaningless jumble of characters (different, incidentally,
> from the PGP-cipherptext-like characters Tim quoted).

Thats what that thing was susposed to be. I got the same things with 
pine, which I know is susposed to be mime aware. Anyway all this talk 
about it gave me an idea. A PGP mime extention, where your mail says that 
you have a PGP encoded message, enter secret pass phrase to contiue. I 
think this would do a couple of things

	First get PGP installed on more machines. Sys Admins who install 
	MIME aware applications would almost be required to install PGP
	beacuse it is a part of MIME.

	Secone more people would be introduced to PGP. The first time they
	use a MIME aware application ie. PINE they would be given a 
	message that they do not have a public/private key set up, ect. 
	That time could be used to explain the basics of encryption, 
	public/private key's, and security issuse of using PGP. 

	Third PGP would be more frequently used beacuse it would be right 
	there with there E-Mail, ect. It would not require as much work 
	to set up beacuse the programs could prompt to do things
	... Do you want to encrypt this E-Mail with the recipiants public 
	key [Yn] ...

					Groove on dude
					Michael Conlen

	
- ---
[This message has been signed by an auto-signing service.  A valid signature
means only that it has been received at the address corresponding to the
signature and forwarded.]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: 2.6.2
Comment: Gratis auto-signing service

iQBFAwUBLvCAzyoZzwIn1bdtAQFCnQGAi19XGrhhoUi7gaAJnG6UUeUjUqvX9yL+
m7qc768s3wEs5sdEqY2mT+JVCT1ES3PB
=tQFE
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----

Michael  Conlen scribbles:

> Thats what that thing was susposed to be. I got the same things with
> pine, which I know is susposed to be mime aware. Anyway all this talk
> about it gave me an idea. A PGP mime extention, where your mail says that
> you have a PGP encoded message, enter secret pass phrase to contiue. I
> think this would do a couple of things

This is out in draft form.

> 	First get PGP installed on more machines. Sys Admins who install
> 	MIME aware applications would almost be required to install PGP
> 	beacuse it is a part of MIME.

Just like they are almost required to install MS Word because of the
existance of application/ms-word?

Speaking as a SysAdmin, if it were a limited use item, where only a
few people wanted it, I would show the users how to set up their own
MIME handling, like metamail's .mailcap file.

> 	Secone more people would be introduced to PGP. The first time they
> 	use a MIME aware application ie. PINE they would be given a
> 	message that they do not have a public/private key set up, ect.
> 	That time could be used to explain the basics of encryption,
> 	public/private key's, and security issuse of using PGP.

Only if the user chose to send things in application/pgp (or is it
text/pgp?)  If they chose to send text/plain, they'd never have to
deal with PGP.

Forcing PGP down people's throats is not a way of winning "converts."
You need to convince them of the need, they present well-integrated
tools that make it simple.  If you try to force people to use PGP,
they'll find work-arounds and do what they can to avoid it.

Bob

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: 2.6.1

iQCVAwUBLvCae+S0CjsjWS0VAQHYrgP/ZtHYxq1iVJmDMlMj3GIwfKfTGm+Dka63
8i1z1b5tRaML26Ny+P47ssGINAwA3/d5TsOH8VUh5ZhVVYZ7+paveS1rNBcKf8ek
JtnpSVrJ2QCW5QEamEs8wUUQJeHB1qGw85GLR56b1+YOQlI5qQ/DYDlI8Ip6xH3h
T+Pqo3zBGiA=
=x+8K
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

On Thu, 15 Dec 1994, Bob Snyder wrote:

> Only if the user chose to send things in application/pgp (or is it
> text/pgp?)  If they chose to send text/plain, they'd never have to
> deal with PGP.
> 
> Forcing PGP down people's throats is not a way of winning "converts."
> You need to convince them of the need, they present well-integrated
> tools that make it simple.  If you try to force people to use PGP,
> they'll find work-arounds and do what they can to avoid it.

True, I never want to foce people to use something, however an 
application so universily used such as e-mail would make a good place to 
present PGP and allow people to have access to it without downloading and 
compiling PGP for their selves, for each computer that uses PGP, ect. If 
PGP remains as obscure to thoes not intrested in crypto, then I think the 
program will not reach the people it is intented for, the masses. Not 
everyone knows how to compile a program, or has the intrest in it enough 
to read the docs that come with it to set it up. this is the reason I 
have not used it yet, beacuse of just getting it set up. 

						Groove on Dude
						Michael Conlen