the kernel module .ko files are sent as base64 encoded in thunderbird

Question

I am participating in the Eudyptula Challenge . where they need the attachments to be sent as text/plain . I tried it through various means and had a number of problems

-> gmail web ui - no facility to do that . only body can be set as plain text

-> used mailsend (https://github.com/muquit/mailsend) - I am unable to send the whole message body , but only line by line ... and it seems like it has a bug when sending three attachments . some are skipped .

-> evolution - still the attachments are base64 encoded then finally I came to Thunderbird which many people say as successful sending patches.

Yes I tried using different links http://www.stabellini.net/thunderbird-configuration.txt , http://lxr.free-electrons.com/source/Documentation/email-clients.txt and configured thunderbird and now I will say what I achieved and what I need to achieve

I am sending 1) message body 2) three attachments

1. Makefile
2. logfile
3. task1.ko - a kernel module

what I need to achieve ? send all the above as text/plain without base64 encoding

what I achieved ? I got to send the

message body as

Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

logfile(attachment) as

Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; name="syslog" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="syslog"

Makefile (attachment)

Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; name="Makefile" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="Makefile"

task1.ko (attachment) as

Content-Type: application/octet-stream; name="task1.ko" Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64 Content-Disposition: attachment; filename="task1.ko"

the problem is the last one ... still task1.ko is being base64 encoded .. if I send this mail in this form, the response mail says

You sent me base64 attachments, which I can not understand at all :( Please go read the introductory email again about why this is a bad thing. It is also a very normal thing to have happen if you are using gmail, the web interface almost always does this. Please see the kernel file: http://lxr.free-electrons.com/source/Documentation/email-clients.txt for some hints on how to properly configure your email client on how to be able to send attachments in a format that can be used by the kernel community.

Someone please help me from this. I did the task 2 days ago and this mail sending is delayed because of this problem .. Please help ..

Note : I also have another doubt . the question says " Also be sure to send the kernel module you wrote, along with the Makefile you created to build the module." . Actually the problem is with sending the ko file which is a binary file . so have I misinterpreted the question and am I to send the .c file instead of the .ko file ?.. is it possible to send the binary file as UTF-8 text/plain still ?

Answer 1

Base64-encoded is not a problem when sending binary files; it's the standard method these days. However, Eudyptula doesn't want the compiled module in the first place – it is useless for contest purposes. You must send the source code instead; that is, all the .c and .h files.