[NNTP] Working group last call

[Russ Allbery]

Ken Murchison <ken at oceana.com> writes:
> Clive D.W. Feather wrote:

>> Version 2: is the following allowed with a conforming server?
>>     [C] CAPABILITIES
>>     [S] 101 Capability list:
>>     [S] VERSION 2     [S] READER LISTGROUP     [S] LIST ACTIVE NEWSGROUPS
>>     [S] STREAMING
>>     [S] .
>>     [C] MODE STREAM
>>     [S] 501 Unknown mode STREAM

> I think we'd like it to be since we're deprecating MODE STREAM, but this
> is probably an unrealistic goal in the short term for interop reasons.

> Russ, how do you want to handle this?  Should we make MODE STREAM
> mandatory to implement for servers, but warn clients that this command
> should only be used with legacy servers, and that this command will be
> most likely removed from later versions of the specification?

I would tend to be conservative here, since if a server that supports
streaming and that's upgraded to support this specification drops MODE
STREAM, it will fail to interoperate with existing servers.  I think it
makes sense to make it mandatory (or at least a SHOULD) to implement on
the server side, but on the client side we should say that it's only for
compatibility with existing servers.  (I don't see the justification in
preventing the client from sending it, since sending it won't cause
interoperability problems, but I do think there should be a warning, as
you say, that the command will be dropped in a later verison of the
specification.)

-- 
Russ Allbery (rra at stanford.edu)             <http://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/>