Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!wuarchive!gem.mps.ohio-state.edu!apple!bbn!bbn.com!rsalz
From: rsalz@bbn.com (Rich Salz)
Newsgroups: comp.sources.d
Subject: Re: Why "shar: Shell Archive  (v1.22)" is bad
Message-ID: <1983@prune.bbn.com>
Date: 22 Sep 89 18:32:38 GMT
References: <1979@prune.bbn.com> <444@crdos1.crd.ge.COM> <1989Sep22.005247.11518@pcrat.uucp>
Organization: BBN Systems and Technologies Corporation
Lines: 20

I apologize to Bill Davidsen.  I knew he was the author of the v1.22 shar,
I was just (obliquely) leaving his name off to avoid having the discussion
get personal.  If you're shipping files around to Unix sites, then v1.22
is a great tool:  it's easy to use, the auto-split is nice, etc.

For world-wide posting in places like comp.sources.unix, however, I find
that features like the above (cf. my original article with its two primary
complaints) tend to get in the way much more than they benefit.  I base
this on my reactions when I'm sent postings, and from the tons of email I
get from readers who've dropped a piece, read news on one machine and use
the cshar shell parser to unpack things on a PC, and so on.

Folks, by all means, please use the tool that suits you best.  I was just
pointing out some problems that I have with a very common one.  There's
nothing wrong with saying "this doesn't do the job for me."  In
retrospect, I probably should have written a more subdued title.
	/r$
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