Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!agate!helios.ee.lbl.gov!ucsd!sdcsvax!amos!hartung From: hartung@amos.ling.ucsd.edu (Jeff Hartung) Newsgroups: comp.binaries.ibm.pc.d Subject: Re: we need an unmoderated binaries group Summary: No we don't Message-ID: <6345@sdcsvax.UCSD.Edu> Date: 3 May 89 04:13:19 GMT References: <1944@csuna.csun.edu> Sender: nobody@sdcsvax.UCSD.Edu Reply-To: hartung@amos.ucsd.edu (Jeff Hartung) Followup-To: comp.binaries.ibm.pc Distribution: na Organization: Univ. of Calif., San Diego Lines: 71 In article <1944@csuna.csun.edu> abcscagz@csuna.csun.edu (Jeff Boeing) writes: > >Back in the good old days before c.b.i.p became moderated, anyone who wanted >to share his binaries with the usenet world was free to. > It is true that since the group became moderated we've seen an (almost) >constant flux of archiving, dearchiving, and *NIX-like utilities; however, >we have also seen times when Rahul's site has gone down and the only thing >we got on c.b.i.p was dead space and a HUGE backlog of programs. Once >again, I am led to understand that the posting of the long-awaited PC >NetHack version 2.3 will be delayed due to problems at Rahul's end. As the person who compiled and submitted PC NetHack 2.3e to c.b.i.p., I feel that I should comment, least it seem that I blamed Rahul in my announcement to rec.games.hack for the delay. I have, to date, submitted NetHack to him 3 times. The first time I was told by him that the game would be posted around April 15 or possibly earlier. Around the 8th of that month he asked me if it was debugged enough to not be followed by a replacement in a few months. I told him that the only replacement would be 3.0, which would be quite a way off as it would need a bit of tinkering to get it to compiled. About the same time, someone posted an article to rec.games.hack saying that they had compiled the game with TC 2.0 using my posted fixes and could not get the game to restore saved games. Seeing this as a major problem, I immediately told Rahul *not* to post what I had sent, but to wait until I could recompile the game with the fix for that bug. I sent the second, improved NetHack to him a while later, only to discover a couple of days later that there was a bad pointer I couldn't locate that caused the game to crash when an object was polymorphed with a wand of polymorph. I sent Rahul another note saying he could ditch the latest NetHack I'd sent and I'd look for that bug. I got the bugfix for *that* mailed to me, patched zap.c, recompiled and then tested the hell out of the game. I only sent the most recent NETHACK.EXE to Rahul last week. Meanwhile, he has been reportedly very ill, but promised to resume c.b.i.p. postings early this week (of 5/1). Now, as to an unmoderated newsgroup, there are some problems. (1) Viruses, trojans, bombs, etc. (2) Reposts and garbage that dosn't work, which is costly to Usenet recipients and unnecessary. (3) Stuff that is copyrighted gets posted. (4) Et cetera. The unmoderated c.b.i.p. was about to be closed down due to the above difficulties. It exists now only because it is moderated. > A moderated group for pc-compatible binaries serves a necessary >function. But we need a place where ANYONE can just leave a program for >anyone's consideration, with no guarantees and no strings attached. >This group fails in this function, especially since posting binaries >here is considered in "bad taste". > How about comp.binaries.ibm.pc.unmoderated? Or, if that's too >long a name, WE keep comp.binaries.ibm.pc, and Rahul gets comp.binaries. >ibm.pc.digest or something. > >Regards, >-- >Jeff Boeing: ...!csun.edu!csuna!abcscagz (formerly tracer@stb.UUCP) >---------------------------------------------------------------------------- >"Thank you for shopping at Pons & Fleischman's used reactor shop." > -- Maarten Litmaath, rec.games.hack --Jeff Hartung-- Disclaimer: My opinions only, etc., etc., BLAH! BLAH! BLAH!... ARPA - hartung@amos.ucsd.edu UUCP - ucsd!amos.ucsd.edu!hartung