ietf-nntp New wording on article numbers - draft 2

[Jack De Winter]

>    Once again, why is everyone a strong proponent of keeping 0 0 0 ?
>
>Partly as it seems this is what is done by every major server
>that currently exists - and given that it is very hard to be sure
>that there may not be clients that actually depend upon that
>behaviour.
>
>But also because for a (traditional) server that wants to make the
>count accurate it means the only place they need to look is the
>directory containing the articles, they can ignore the active file
>(don't need to find the entry at all).
>
>That is
>	first = last = count = 0;
>	fd = opendir(convert_group_to_path(arg));
>	while (dp = readdir(fd)) {
>		if (n = is_an_article(dp->d_name)) {
>			if (first == 0 || n < first)
>				first = n;
>			if (n > last)
>				last = n;
>			count++;
>		}
>	}
>	closedir(fd);
>	fprintf(buffer, "%d %d %d", first, last, count);
>
>and then "buffer" is used in the response.   There's no way to
>get other numbers for "first" and "last" without going to the
>active file (or equivalent).
>
>And finally because there is no way you're ever going to get
>consensus for forbitting it, or even strongly recommending
>against it.   Isn't that clear?

Fair enough.  I think that is a fair summation of the "0 0 0" case.
As I have mentioned before, I do not like it, and would prefer to
see another option being generated, but I could live with it if it
is one of a couple of possible options.

regards,
Jack
-------------------------------------------------
Jack De Winter - Wildbear Consulting, Inc.
(519) 576-3873		http://www.wildbear.on.ca/

Author of SLMail(95/NT) (http://www.seattlelab.com/) and other great products.