[NNTP] LIST EXTENSIONS (again)

Howard Swinehart binaryboy at binaryboy.com
Sun Nov 7 10:27:41 PST 2004


From: "Russ Allbery" <rra at stanford.edu>
> Howard Swinehart <binaryboy at binaryboy.com> writes:
>> NNTPV2 was supposed to distinguish between Netscape Collabra (has LIST
>> EXTENSIONS but wrongly advertises OVER) and a truly compliant
>> server. Without NNTPV2 and without a version number, a client based on
>> this proposal won't see a difference between a future incompatible
>> NNTPVx server and Netscape Collabra because neither will return NNTPV2.
>
> I think that's actually the correct behavior.  That future server is
> speaking a protocol that the client doesn't understand, which is, if one
> thinks about it in the right direction, exactly the same as the case for
> Netscape Collabra.  The client can give up, or fall back on RFC 977 and
> try using commands at random and hope, which is pretty much the case for
> Collabra today.

The difference is that a client author can potentially experiment and create
a workaround for non-compliant servers that exist today while the future
protocol is completely unknown.  A client might want to give up immediately
when it sees a backwards incompatible version number.





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