1 :mod:`uu` --- Encode and decode uuencode files 2 ============================================== 3 4 .. module:: uu 5 :synopsis: Encode and decode files in uuencode format. 6 .. moduleauthor:: Lance Ellinghouse 7 8 **Source code:** :source:`Lib/uu.py` 9 10 -------------- 11 12 This module encodes and decodes files in uuencode format, allowing arbitrary 13 binary data to be transferred over ASCII-only connections. Wherever a file 14 argument is expected, the methods accept a file-like object. For backwards 15 compatibility, a string containing a pathname is also accepted, and the 16 corresponding file will be opened for reading and writing; the pathname ``'-'`` 17 is understood to mean the standard input or output. However, this interface is 18 deprecated; it's better for the caller to open the file itself, and be sure 19 that, when required, the mode is ``'rb'`` or ``'wb'`` on Windows. 20 21 .. index:: 22 single: Jansen, Jack 23 single: Ellinghouse, Lance 24 25 This code was contributed by Lance Ellinghouse, and modified by Jack Jansen. 26 27 The :mod:`uu` module defines the following functions: 28 29 30 .. function:: encode(in_file, out_file[, name[, mode]]) 31 32 Uuencode file *in_file* into file *out_file*. The uuencoded file will have the 33 header specifying *name* and *mode* as the defaults for the results of decoding 34 the file. The default defaults are taken from *in_file*, or ``'-'`` and ``0666`` 35 respectively. 36 37 38 .. function:: decode(in_file[, out_file[, mode[, quiet]]]) 39 40 This call decodes uuencoded file *in_file* placing the result on file 41 *out_file*. If *out_file* is a pathname, *mode* is used to set the permission 42 bits if the file must be created. Defaults for *out_file* and *mode* are taken 43 from the uuencode header. However, if the file specified in the header already 44 exists, a :exc:`uu.Error` is raised. 45 46 :func:`decode` may print a warning to standard error if the input was produced 47 by an incorrect uuencoder and Python could recover from that error. Setting 48 *quiet* to a true value silences this warning. 49 50 51 .. exception:: Error() 52 53 Subclass of :exc:`Exception`, this can be raised by :func:`uu.decode` under 54 various situations, such as described above, but also including a badly 55 formatted header, or truncated input file. 56 57 58 .. seealso:: 59 60 Module :mod:`binascii` 61 Support module containing ASCII-to-binary and binary-to-ASCII conversions. 62
