From: rhys@meteor.brisnet.org.au (Rhys Weatherley)
Newsgroups: comp.bbs.waffle
Subject: Re: Offline Readers and broken software
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 93 18:57:02 +1000
Reply-To: rhys%meteor@bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au
Organization: meteor - Home of Helldiver and UW/PC
X-Newsreader: Helldiver 1.08 (Waffle 1.65)

In <1jsqs3INNm5b@gaia.ucs.orst.edu> stanley@skyking.OCE.ORST.EDU (John Stanley) writes:

>>Then why did Rhys email me the new HSEND.EXE fix, which now correctly
>>sets my headers?

>Because he figured that you wouldn't bother to act on your own behalf
>and fix your own problems with the software you already have, and he has
>somewhat more interest in following the procedures that the rest of the
>does?

Don't put words in my mouth John.  In this situation both Carlos' setup
and Helldiver were at fault.  After discussing it with Carlos, I decided
that a fix _was_ necessary to Helldiver and made it.  Through-out the
whole episode I got the impression that Carlos _wanted_ to find a solution
but was constrained by his service provider.

I could have easily taken your stance John and told Carlos to get lost
and fix it himself, but fortunately I'm in the business of supporting
users, not sitting on my high horse and preaching at those who have
systems I know nothing about.

>>Since now HELLDIVER works properly, 

>If your Waffle configuration was correct, Helldiver would be able to
>read the same static file your Waffle did. Helldiver is not and was not
>at fault here.

Helldiver _was_ partially to blame.  It wasn't fully interpreting all
relevant STATIC file settings - specifically the "netmail" and "netnews"
settings.  On 99.999% of sites, there are no problems.  On those few sites
where those lines are necessary, Helldiver has problems, and other people
(with more conventional Waffle setups) have reported similar problems
to me.

Writing net software, including news readers, is not a trivial exercise.
How many hours of work have you put into similar software John?

A note to Carlos: John is a professional net.agitator, so don't expect
him to cool down anytime soon.  He's a great proponent of the theory
that those who aren't as good as him shouldn't be on the net. :-(
As the net expands more and more into the real world, mistakes will be
made John.  Ranting about them won't make them go away - getting your
hands dirty helping the new users understand what we take for granted will.

People have said to me before to (paraphrased) "go away and create your own
system, and if everyone likes it they'll all flock to it, otherwise don't
change things".  Well, I _have_ created my own system, endeavouring to
pull USENET out of the big sites and down to the PC platform, and people
_have_ flocked to it.  But, I don't consider my job finished - it's an
ongoing project to weed out the special cases that weren't handled in
the previous version.  In this case, Carlos was a very spectacular
special case. :-)

So, could we please give the "Carlos has a broken STATIC file" thread a
rest now, and get back to the business of discussing Waffle?

Cheers,

Rhys.

-- 
Rhys Weatherley, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.   G'day!!
e-mail: rhys@meteor.brisnet.org.au (normal) or rhys@cs.uq.oz.au (long msgs)