Re: Preparing a new draft.../ PGP versions 5 and later / ciphertext-format query.....

[John W Noerenberg II <jwn2@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 7:53 PM +0200 8/21/01, Werner Koch wrote:
>  > BTW: Why was Radix-64 developed; and what are the problems of having
> >  ciphertext
> >  output as a hexadecimal file?
>
> Because it produces only an 33% overhead compared to the 100% overhead
> of plain hexdigits.
>
> We need to save some bandwidth so that we can use more funny mail
> headers :-)

In addition to being more compact than hex digits, it uses a 
character symbol set that is considered "safe" across all systems. It 
wouldn't do if the encoding method included characters that aren't 
representable or whose numeric equivalent is ambiguous.

Bandwidth does matter -- even when the email headers are longer than 
the message....which is goofy, I know...which is why a message saying 
only "ok" or "thanks" may be polite, but not necessarily the most 
efficient thing to do.

best,
--

john noerenberg
jwn2@xxxxxxxxxxxx
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