uuencode
, uudecode
,
b64encode
, b64decode
—
encode/decode a binary file
uuencode |
[-m ] [-r ]
[-o output_file]
[file] name |
uudecode |
[-cimprs ] [file ...] |
uudecode |
[-i ] -o
output_file |
b64encode |
[-r ] [-o
output_file] [file]
name |
b64decode |
[-cimprs ] [file ...] |
b64decode |
[-i ] -o
output_file [file] |
The uuencode
and uudecode
utilities are used to transmit binary files over transmission mediums that do
not support other than simple ASCII data. The
b64encode
utility is synonymous with
uuencode
with the -m
flag
specified. The b64decode
utility is synonymous with
uudecode
with the -m
flag
specified.
The uuencode
utility reads
file (or by default the standard input) and writes an
encoded version to the standard output, or output_file
if one has been specified. The encoding uses only printing ASCII characters
and includes the mode of the file and the operand name
for use by uudecode
.
The uudecode
utility transforms
uuencoded files (or by default, the standard input) into
the original form. The resulting file is named either
name or (depending on options passed to
uudecode
) output_file and will
have the mode of the original file except that setuid and execute bits are
not retained. The uudecode
utility ignores any
leading and trailing lines.
The following options are available for
uuencode
:
-m
- Use the Base64 method of encoding, rather than the traditional
uuencode
algorithm.
-r
- Produce raw output by excluding the initial and final framing lines.
-o
output_file
- Output to output_file instead of standard
output.
The following options are available for
uudecode
:
-c
- Decode more than one uuencoded file from file if
possible.
-i
- Do not overwrite files.
-m
- When used with the
-r
flag, decode Base64 input
instead of traditional uuencode
input. Without
-r
it has no effect.
-o
output_file
- Output to output_file instead of any pathname
contained in the input data.
-p
- Decode file and write output to standard
output.
-r
- Decode raw (or broken) input, which is missing the initial and possibly
the final framing lines. The input is assumed to be in the traditional
uuencode
encoding, but if the
-m
flag is used, or if the utility is invoked as
b64decode
, then the input is assumed to be in
Base64 format.
-s
- Do not strip output pathname to base filename. By default
uudecode
deletes any prefix ending with the last
slash '/' for security reasons.
The following example packages up a source tree, compresses it, uuencodes it and
mails it to a user on another system. When uudecode
is
run on the target system, the file ``src_tree.tar.Z'' will be created which
may then be uncompressed and extracted into the original tree.
tar cf - src_tree | compress |
uuencode src_tree.tar.Z | mail user@example.com
The following example unpacks all uuencoded files from your
mailbox into your current working directory.
The following example extracts a compressed tar archive from your
mailbox
uudecode -o /dev/stdout < $MAIL | zcat | tar xfv -
The uudecode
and uuencode
utilities appeared in 4.0BSD.
Files encoded using the traditional algorithm are expanded by 35% (3 bytes
become 4 plus control information).