Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!lll-winken!lll-lcc!longstaf
From: longstaf@lll-lcc.aRpA (Thomas A Longstaff)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.hypercard
Subject: Re: comments on binaries
Message-ID: <1523@lll-lcc.aRpA>
Date: 2 Mar 88 17:43:13 GMT
References: <458@stech.UUCP> <717@gethen.UUCP> <43688@sun.uucp>
Reply-To: longstaf@lll-lcc.llnl.gov.UUCP (Thomas A Longstaff)
Followup-To: 14913
Organization: Lab Comp Ctr, Lawrence Laboratory, Livermore Ca
Lines: 37
Keywords: binaries hypercard
Summary: Do Nothing, or do it right


Very interesting post.  Given only the three choices of do nothing,
nuke the groups, or archive servers, I would vote for do nothing.  

I am actually in the situation where I have access to a "real" network
(as do you, given the address of this mail), so I can easily get to
archive services.  For this situation, simply pointers to new
additions to the archive are sufficient (when the net is going well,
but thats a different story...)

However, there are at least a reasonable number of *nodes* (not users)
that do not have this kind of access.  If binaries were cut off from
these nodes, the ease of getting and trying out the binaries
(including hypercard stacks as a special case) would drop drasticly.
I'm not saying it couldn't be done, but it would take additional
effort and for many of the posts, the usefulness is not obviously
worth the effort.  

Perhaps the best way to keep everyone happy would be to post summaries
of binaries and their archive location to nodes on arpa-type nets, and
continue to post binaries (at the nodes discretion of course) to
other, less connected, nodes.  Alternatively, if many nodes are in the
former category, some sort of automatic downloading of requested
binaries from the archive could be set up such that the first user at
a node requesting a binary would cause a copy to be stored (at least
for a short time) on the node.  Others would get this copy rather than
cause another download.  In some form, this could even work for the
less connected nodes.

So much for my 2 cents.  

	Tom Longstaff
	longstaf@lll-lcc.llnl.gov 
	{lll-crg,harvard,sun,dual,rutgers,seismo,ihnp4}!lll-lcc!longstaf
	Lawrence Livermore Natl Lab
	L-542, Box 808
	Livermore, CA 94550
	415-423-4416