attaching a binary file to command line email

In yesterday's post (/2007/08/scripted-gnuplot-graphs.html), I created a chart of the previous days' web server connections. Today, I'd like to expand the functionality of the script by having the script automatically email me the previous days' connections plot. Unfortunately, because mail servers strip out line feeds and other control characters from emails, I can't simply attach a binary file to an email. I must first uuencode the binary file that I wish to send.

Uuencode translates binary code into text, in order that email servers can send along a binary file without garbling it. Fedora Core does not have uuencode installed by default. It is packaged within the sharutils rpm. I can go ahead and install this using yum:
[root@computer ~]# yum install sharutils
*Loading "installonlyn" plugin
Setting up Install Process
Setting up repositories
Reading repository metadata in from local files
Parsing package install arguments
Resolving Dependencies
--> Populating transaction set with selected packages. Please wait.
---> Downloading header for sharutils to pack into transaction set.
sharutils-4.6.1-2.i386.rp 100% ========================= 12 kB 00:00
---> Package sharutils.i386 0:4.6.1-2 set to be updated
--> Running transaction check
Dependencies Resolved
=============================================================================
Package Arch Version Repository Size =============================================================================
Installing: sharutils i386 4.6.1-2 core 201 k
Transaction Summary
=============================================================================
Install 1 Package(s) Update 0 Package(s) Remove 0 Package(s)
Total download size: 201 k
Is this ok [y/N]: y
Downloading Packages:
(1/1): sharutils-4.6.1-2. 100% ========================= 201 kB 00:02
Running Transaction Test
Finished Transaction Test
Transaction Test Succeeded
Running Transaction
Installing: sharutils ######################### [1/1]
Installed: sharutils.i386 0:4.6.1-2
Complete!

Once I've installed uuencode, I can test uuencoding a binary file and emailing it via the command line:
uuencode webconn.png webconn.png mail -s 'Web connections for yesterday'

The syntax of the command is relatively simple. The first argument to uuencode is the file to encode. The second argument is the remote file extraction name; ie, the name of the file that your email client will display.

Cool! This worked! So now, I can simply add a few lines of code to yesterday's script:
if [ -s webconn.png ]
then
uuencode webconn.png webconn.png mail -s 'Web connections for yesterday' admin@techanswerguy.com
fi

This is a simple IF-THEN statement to check that the file exists. If the file exists, I will go ahead, uuencode the file and email it.

You can also use other email programs like nail or mutt to email the file. Here are two examples:
mutt -a webconn.png -s "web conns" admin@site.com < /dev/null
echo ¦ nail -H -a webconn.png -s "web conns" admin@site.com

Wonder of wonders, it works! What will they think of next?! :) Reference: http://www.shelldorado.com/articles/mailattachments.html