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MacBinary III (often just referred to as MacBinary) is a format for representing all the information in a Macintosh file (data and resource fork) in one binary file. It is useful for storing a Macintosh file on a non-Macintosh system for later retrieval. Unlike BinHex, MacBinary is a compact format, but it cannot be passed through most electronic mail systems. MacBinary files typically have names ending with the extension ".bin".

Fetch can get and put files in MacBinary III format, as well as get files in MacBinary I and MacBinary II format (earlier versions of the MacBinary standard). See the upload formats help topic for information about automatically encoding files in MacBinary when uploading.

Fetch automatically recognizes and decodes MacBinary files when downloading, although automatic recognition can be turned on and off by selecting a remote file whose name ends with ".bin", choosing Remote > Get Info to show the info window, and, in the Transfer Options pane, checking or unchecking the Automatically decode files like this checkbox.

Fetch automatically recognizes and decodes MacBinary files when downloading, although automatic recognition can be turned on and off by either:

  • Selecting a remote file whose name ends with ".bin", choosing Remote > Get Info to show the info window, and, in the Transfer Options pane, checking or unchecking the Automatically decode files like this checkbox — this will enable or disable decoding of MacBinary files but will not affect the decoding of other formats, such as Zip or StuffIt archives;
  • Or choosing Fetch > Preferences, clicking the Download tab, and checking or unchecking the Allow automatic decoding of downloaded files checkbox — this will enable or disable decoding of all file types.

Some FTP servers (especially ones that run on the Macintosh, such as Rumpus and CrushFTP) recognize MacBinary format. If Fetch determines that it is connected to one of these servers, it will try to use MacBinary for all transfers.

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