[NNTP] Article number wording

[Urs Janßen]

On Fri, Jul 29, 2005 at 12:49:50AM +0700, Steve Walker wrote:
> Russ Allbery wrote:
> 
> >No matter what we say or don't say in this draft, you're still going to
> >have serious problems in two years with regular news reader clients.
> >
> 
> I think that the clients that currently don't support 64 bit numbers 
> will be fixed soon since it's a very easy process.  That is, if the RFC 

I (as a client author) don't think so - it's not easy to fix code which
runns on a bunch of different (some very old and/or obscure) unices.
exceeding 32bit artnums within the next ~5 years means asking for trouble,
no matter that the RFCs say.

> doesn't expressly forbid 64 bit numbers.  If the new RFC forbids 64 bit 
> numbers then the client developers will have to choose between being 
> non-compliant and actually working on all servers.  This is a potential 
> mess.

as most servers (>99%) won't exceed the 32bit artnums within the next ~5
years client authors do not have fix it emediately...

IMHO we should leave the artnum stuff for the next RFC.

urs
-- 
"Only whimps use tape backup: _real_ men just upload their important stuff
 on ftp, and let the rest of the world mirror it ;)" - Linus