Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!wuarchive!kuhub.cc.ukans.edu!anu-news!list From: munnari!csc.anu.oz.au!gih900@UUNET.UU.NET (Geoff Huston) Newsgroups: news.software.anu-news Subject: Re: "requestable" control messages and ANU-NEWS enhancement? Message-ID: <8910191344.AA12187@uunet.uu.net> Date: 20 Oct 89 04:34:04 GMT Sender: ANU-NEWS Discussion Reply-To: Geoff Huston Lines: 32 X-cc: GIH900@uunet.UU.NET >In article <3209.253b4e14@fps.mcw.edu>, brodie@fps.mcw.edu writes: >> I found out by CHANCE that my news system had sent out a reply to >> a recent "version" request from uunet. >> >> I think that "requestable" control messages (uuname, version, sendsys) >> should be additionally handled by the following: >> >> 1) MAIL a copy of the request to USENET. This is done with "newgroup", >> "rmgroup", and (optionally) "cancel" messages. Why not the others? > >I suppose this is reasonable. Personally, I am registered to read the control >group, so I see all this stuff anyway. If it is REALLY important that you see >all the version and sendsys messages, just subscribe to control. I use a kill >filter to skip over cancel messages. It seems harmless enough to send out the >version number of the software without manual intervention. I've got to agree with BOb on this one - the uuname response from VMS is a null response - the version and sendsys responses are also automatic with the relevant information. I must admit that my view is that the provision of this information is a component of being a member of USENET, and that an automatic response is far more painless than sending yet another mail item to the local system manager to forward.... but like anything else in software these code decisions of mine are not cast in stone.... You can modify the posting code in NEWSADD.C to post the mail to the local senet address rather than the original poster in your version of NEWS... I would need a fair deal of response to change this default action in the distributed code as I'm sure that the majority of sys managers would find the automatic handling of these control postings a positive rather than a negative aspect of NEWS. Geoff Huston