email attachments

[scooterscot]

Why are email attachments in general much larger than the actual attachment sent? Is something added to them by the email client?

An e-mail just in, 3 attachments 7MB total file size of all 3 files. Email size 21MB! What's going on?

 

[Cliphead]

Cos the files need to be encoded, binary data gets encoded as text hence the bigger size.

 

[AtW]

Cos the files need to be encoded, binary data gets encoded as text hence the bigger size.

Careful, you might push some of that math stuff out of scooters head

 

[Clippy]

scooter, meet the Technical section of the forum.

Technical section of the forum, meet scooter.

 

[minestrone]

scooter, meet the Technical section of the forum.

Technical section of the forum, meet scooter.

 

[scooterscot]

So wait a minute are you IT whizz kids telling me the protocol used in email transmission sucks?

Why has someone not invented a binary email protocol?

Would sending less data not be a green thing to do?

 

[d000hg]

I would guess changing email protocol would be such a nightmare, nobody dares. Or they did, and nobody can handle the hassle of using it.

 

[scooterscot]

I bet they'd change it in a minute if someone could calculated the energy wasted sending unnecessary data.

OK how many joules per byte in a typical e-mail sent within a country?

Same question, the globe?

 

[Paddy]

Why are email attachments in general much larger than the actual attachment sent? Is something added to them by the email client?

An e-mail just in, 3 attachments 7MB total file size of all 3 files. Email size 21MB! What's going on?

I suspect that it’s to do with the email system you are using that wants to attachments as preview. If you select Text rather than HTML it may make a difference.

Cos the files need to be encoded, binary data gets encoded as text hence the bigger size.

I don't see that. the files are already in binary and the coding should not change infact you can Zip files and make them smaller to send thru email.


Be my friend on facetube

 

[AtW]

OK how many joules per byte in a typical e-mail sent within a country?

Do you even see email on that list of biggest traffic usage areas?