ietf-nntp Simplification of wildmat

[Andrew Gierth]

>>>>> "Charles" == Charles Lindsey <chl at clw.cs.man.ac.uk> writes:

 Charles> No, there is benefit in the improved wildmats because they
 Charles> instantly become applicable

Writing standards does not change the world.

I reiterate: if we want to _change_ (and it _is_ a change from
existing usage) the definition of commands like LIST ACTIVE so that
they take a list of (possibly-negated) wildmat patterns, then we
should make that change part of the description of those commands (and
include a compatibility note) rather than shoehorn stuff into the
wildmat definition itself.

 Charles> So I prefer to go with Clive's formulation, but cutting it
 Charles> down to the minimum necessary to match newsgroup-names
 Charles> (leaving implementors to do the best they can if they
 Charles> continue to support XPAT). This means at least including '!'
 Charles> and ',',

see above.

 Charles> though I could be persuaded to leave out '[...]',
 Charles> and I think there is no remaining need for '\' at all.

it is perhaps worth noting that at least one reasonably common
implementation (Diablo) supports neither [...] nor \ in wildmats.

-- 
Andrew.