Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!bellcore!texbell!merch!cpe!hal6000!trsvax!johnm From: johnm@trsvax.UUCP Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc Subject: Re: GSARC - non-compatible more efficie Message-ID: <216100063@trsvax> Date: 26 Oct 88 13:50:00 GMT References: <4454218@ Lines: 40 Nf-ID: #R:> >>PLEASE let's not start considering the use of YET ANOTHER standard. A very >>usable, efficient, widely available, and well supported standard now exists > ^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ >>in the form of FREEZOO. > >Is this a joke !? > > >Why? >Let's keep using PK361. >Why not? I realize that you will probably get more flames from this than you know what to do with, but here is a (hopefully) flame free answer to the question, "Why not?". 1) PK361 is heavily involved in litigation at this moment and may very well become an UNDISTRIBUTABLE product if SEA has its way about it. 2) Even if #1 does not come to pass, Phil Katz has already declared that he "will be" coming out with an all new algorithm and program shortly AND by the requirements of the lawsuit it won't be compatible with his old work. 3) Many of us feel that continuing to have anything to do with the ARC "standard" constitutes tacit approval of SEA and its lawsuit. This is because continued support of the standard could only help them. 4) The ARC "standard" largely ignores the fact that people use computers other than the IBM PC. Zoo is usable by people with Amigas, Xenix systems, Unix sites, NeXT's, etc because it does not impose an arbitrary eight character-dot- three character name convention on the files. As the owner of an Amiga this is very important to me. I'm sure others can think of even more reasons but these should be sufficient to explain exactly why we can no longer use PK361 or (I believe) the ARC format in general. John Munsch