Hi, I don't know that as an owner I have any control over this, but I have
been asked, so ...

I am a list owner for a fairly active list.  At least one subscriber uses
a pgp signature.  He contacted me yesterday telling me that the signature
file that appears in his posts on the list can not be verified when he
checks them.  Further investigation suggests that tabs (0x'09' in ASCII)
in the mail are being converted to blanks.  here is the Content-type
header from one of his posts:

  Content-Type: multipart/signed; micalg=pgp-sha1;
          protocol="application/pgp-signature"; boundary="   ...omitted

here is an example of a signature file:

  -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
  Version: GnuPG v1.0.4 (GNU/Linux)
  Comment: For info see http://www.gnupg.org

  iD8DBQE6bdqaOEeIn1XyubARAswhAJ4vdkkue1auW212gPW5ASHeN6sQ
  4BG6Q2LOJPaZXeAJwDeK/0w=
  =torq
  -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----

  ie, itself a text file.

The key shown in this file is a hash of the contents of message sent - ie
it will vary depending upon what is sent, but uses the original contents
when created.  In the body of the original message, tabs were used in a
number of areas.  the message as it appeared on the list looked just as he
had sent it.

The list is set for NOHTML, but attachments are allowed (for now)

Here is the "Parts/Attachments:" header info:

  Parts/Attachments:
     1 Shown    ~84 lines  Text
     2          240 bytes  Application

It is my assumption that the Listserver is not altering the file, but
could the fact it is (and is seen as) "text", prevent the tabs from being
preserved?  I suppose it is a fine line:  if the tab chars are preserved,
but not honored, the text will show up in odd locations (possibly
preceeded by some psuedo-control characters).  Blank padding will preserve
the look of the original, but not the actual contents.  Tabs are -
after all - binary characters (in practice, they are kind of in their
own world as they seem to be correctly xlated when sent to/from our ibm
mainframe - ebcdic tab is 0x'05' - i don't know of other chars that are,
although perhaps that xlation is an exception here).

So - Does (should) Listserv preserve tabs in text attachments?
Thanks,
--Joe
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