ietf-nntp LISTGROUP

[Charles Lindsey]

In <20011229155705.J93705 at demon.net> "Clive D.W. Feather" <clive at demon.net> writes:


>Charles Lindsey said:
>> P45-7	211 -> 211 n l h ggg {+ verbiage as in GROUP command}
>> 	{I find it odd that the 211 response from LISTGROUP is not the
>> 	same as the 211 response from GROUP; I also note that the model
>> 	NNTP implementation provides the full set of parameters: e.g.
>> 	    group comp.risks
>> 	    211 1 562 562 comp.risks
>> 	    listgroup comp.risks
>> 	    211 1 562 562 comp.risks
>> 	    562
>> 	    . }

>Demon's server doesn't output this material on a 211 response. Therefore I
>assume that other servers don't.

Also From Andrew:
>I would _assume_ that those clients that use LISTGROUP ignore the text
>of the response, therefore returning the same response as for GROUP
>would not actually break them. Certainly current clients can't expect
>the additional info, since INN certainly does not provide it.

And also from Greg Andruk, in a different thread, that having a 211
response doing different things for two different commands was a Bad
Thing.

>This means that defining the 211 to match GROUP would be a significant
>change, so I'm against it. Furthermore, the examples should *not* include
>this data to avoid confusion.

Either we do that, or we take the bull by the horns and make the change,
at least at the "SHOULD" level. At least existing clients are not
expecting it, so no harm there. The only problem arises when new clients
see it in the standard, try to use it, and then encounter an old server
that does not supply it. Can we live with that? What use are clients
likely to use that information for?

-- 
Charles H. Lindsey ---------At Home, doing my own thing------------------------
Tel: +44 161 436 6131 Fax: +44 161 436 6133   Web: http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~chl
Email: chl at clw.cs.man.ac.uk      Snail: 5 Clerewood Ave, CHEADLE, SK8 3JU, U.K.
PGP: 2C15F1A9      Fingerprint: 73 6D C2 51 93 A0 01 E7 65 E8 64 7E 14 A4 AB A5