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From: osd@hou2d.UUCP (Orlando Sotomayor-Diaz)
Newsgroups: net.news,net.news.group
Subject: Re: About nuking newsgroups:
Message-ID: <394@hou2d.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 24-May-84 12:31:21 EDT
Article-I.D.: hou2d.394
Posted: Thu May 24 12:31:21 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 30-May-84 08:44:29 EDT
References: <2791@alice.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Holmdel NJ
Lines: 47

In reply to some questions:
	How do you then distinguish between a group that's no
	longer in the active file because it has really been
	removed for good and one that is just tired?  
Read the original proposal. The system would have a tiredgroups
file to identify such groups.  If a cancel group message comes,
the group would be deleted from the active file or the tiredgroups
file, depending on where it is.

The comment:
	You would see the .newstr file get endlessly large with groups
	that will never come back.
I'm not sure the .newstr file is really necessary.  A change in the
way the unsubscribe group command (U) is implemented could be the
answer.

More questions:
	What about those small machines?  Why should thy be
	forced off the network because they can't run a readnews
	big enough to handle all the groups?
Most installations are selective in one way or another (and for
other reasons besides the number of groups) with regards to what
groups they decide to receive and forward.  What may drive
many smaller machines out of the network is the amount of traffic,
not the number of groups.  The amount of traffic, not
surprisingly, is not a linear function of the number of groups
so there are many ways to optimize the load you can handle in
your small machine.

Now a rhetorical question:
	Doesn't seem fair that piddly little groups that should 
	never have come into existence be able to toss a machine
	off the net, does it?
The question of fairness is unfair because
under the present method of creating new groups, who makes the 
value judgement that a group should never
come into existence, even before giving the group a chance to
exist? It's not the network, but usually a very vocal and small group
of administrators that would resort to cancelling groups that
they think should never be created. Again, if a machine can't
handle all its news traffic, it now has ways (locally, or with
the cooperation of its news feed) to cut down the traffic, no
matter how many active or semi-active groups there are.
-- 
Orlando Sotomayor-Diaz	/AT&T Bell Laboratories, Crawfords Corner Road
			/Holmdel, New Jersey, 07733 (Room 3M 325)
Tel: 201-949-1532	/UUCP: {{{ucbvax,decvax}!}{ihnp4,harpo}!}hou2d!osd