Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!csd4.milw.wisc.edu!lll-winken!uunet!cbmvax!vu-vlsi!dsinc!syd
From: syd@dsinc.DSI.COM (Syd Weinstein)
Newsgroups: comp.mail.elm
Subject: Re: Problem With Network Disconnects And Locks
Message-ID: <112@dsinc.DSI.COM>
Date: 21 Apr 89 13:50:58 GMT
References: <996@itivax.iti.org>
Reply-To: syd@dsinc.UUCP (Syd Weinstein)
Organization: Datacomp Systems, Inc., Huntingdon Valley, PA 19006
Lines: 19

In article <996@itivax.iti.org> scs@vax3.iti.org (Steve Simmons) writes:
>Before doing that work can anyone explain to be why to bother with
> the lockfile at all under BSD?

Yes, I can,  It was for two reasons,
1. (and most important) No one could figure a 'fool resistant' way to
decide if a system used .lock type locking or flock type locking for
its mailboxes.  To be safe, we did both.

2. to allow for compatibility with old MUA's that only did .lock type
locking.

Why not just rush in and do pid type locking:  We might in the future,
but for now, remember that not all systems can do kill(pid, 0).
-- 
=====================================================================
Sydney S. Weinstein, CDP, CCP                   Elm Coordinator
Datacomp Systems, Inc.				Voice: (215) 947-9900
syd@DSI.COM or {bpa,vu-vlsi}!dsinc!syd	        FAX:   (215) 938-0235