Chemistry MIME Types
Henry Rzepa (h.rzepa@ic.ac.uk)
Sat, 12 Feb 1994 22:00:21 +0000
I am proposing that the Chemistry community try to get a new MIME
type ratified. MIME is "Multimedia Internet Mail Enclosure", but in fact
is far more than just mail. In conjunction with world-wide-webb and
gopher servers, it enables the seamless interchange of "live" information
between computers. The proposal is to add to the seven existing primary
MIME types (ie, TEXT, AUDIO, VIDEO, IMAGE, APPLICATION
etc) by having a CHEMISTRY type. The protocol allows for secondary
types, ie chemistry/pdb would encode/decode for the Brookhaven type
etc. This allows developers etc to develop programs which automatically
recognise such data (as in a Mosaic/www session for example) or in
an e-mail program. I gather that the initial response from the MIME
coordinators is enthusiastic.
In the first instance, a discussion document will be written, where some
indication of the level of support for the primary/secondary MIME
types would be indicated. I would think that identifying a reasonable
number of secondary types (10? 20?) where in effect de facto standards
exist would be appropriate. I am happy to receive such suggestions from
WATOC members, although whether any suggestions actually make it
to the final standard cannot be foreseen acurately yet. We also need to
indicate that "readers" using such standard are also widespread.
For example, there are many programs that can "read" image/gif
(xv on most Unix systems for example). Equivalent readers of chemistry
MIME types also need to be identified (ie xmol etc etc etc). Any
suggestins here also welcome.
Dr Henry Rzepa, Dept. Chemistry, Imperial College, London, SW7 2AY.
Tel: +44 71 225 8339. Fax: +44 71 589 3869. E-mail: rzepa@ic.ac.uk
http://www.ch.ic.ac.uk/rzepa.html. Sent via MacPPP/MacTCP using Eudora 2.01.
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