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Unable to use mimesender to send attachments with spaces in the file names / paths

 
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Old 03-04-2009
Unable to use mimesender to send attachments with spaces in the file names / paths
Hello,
I found the mimesender multiple attachment emailing shell script in the FAQ of these forums, and I have been able to use it to send multiple files, but only if they don't have spaces in their file name or path.

When I attempt to send a file with spaces in it's name, enclosed within quotations such as -A "/Invoices/ABC DEF.pdf" , I get the errors:
cat: /Invoices/ABC: No such file or director,
cat: DEF.pdf: No such file or directory

Where each word in the file name, which had been separated by spaces, is being looked at as a separate file, instead of as one file.

This is odd, considereing I can run cat "/Invoices/ABC DEF.pdf", without any problem, from the command prompt.


I'm also unable use spaces in the name that the file willl be sent as. If I send it using the option -D "Real filename which the recipient will receive.txt", I get the error: uuencode: cannot open file Real : No such file or directory (error 2). This also appears to be a mimesender issue, since, if I can uuencode a file with spaces in it's name from the command prompt, as long as it's enclosed withing quotations.


Is the problem that the arrays ATTACH and DESC array elements cannot hold a quoted string? The SUBJECT variable is set the same way as the ATTACH and DESC are, yet it can hold a quoted string of words: SUBJECT=$OPTARG, ATTACH[nattach]=$OPTARG, DESC[nattach]=$OPTARG.


Emails sent directly using unix mail and uuencode can send one (non-MIME-compliant) attachment, even if the source file has spaces in it's path/name, or if the renamed file has spaces in it:
uuencode "/Invoices/ABC DEF.pdf" "ABC DEF.pdf" | mail -s "test" rsmorra@amco.ws


I thought that mimesender's problem with spaces might have been due to the quotes already surrounding the file names in the MIME header construction section of mimesender:
scribe_out 'Content-Type: '${TYPE}'; name="'${ATTACH[i]}\"
scribe_out 'Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="'${DESC[i]}\"
I imagine this could be fixed by only adding the quotes conditionally, if the ATTACH[i] and DESC[i] don't already begin and end with them.

After the code that makes the MIME header is fixed to only have one set of quotes surrounding a file name, whether or not there are with spaces in the file name, it seems that mimesender would still break apart the original file name before it sends it cat, and break up the -D "file name as sent.ext" before running it through uuencode.

Any ideas how I can prevent mimesender from breaking apart of the original "/path/and file name", and the "Send as this file name.ext" before they reach cat and uuencode? Thanks a lot.

p.s. Please see a copy of the mimesender script in the attached .txt file.

p.p.s. The actual script does not have a .txt file extension, but that was needed to attach it here. The original script can be seen at the link above. I already tried contacting it's author, and am awaiting reply.
mimesender.txt (20.3 KB) 
 
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