Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!GARNET.BERKELEY.EDU!austins From: austins@GARNET.BERKELEY.EDU (Austin Shelton, 415/642-6158) Newsgroups: comp.protocols.appletalk Subject: Re: Mail for Mac and PC Workstations Message-ID: <8905041700.AA13125@garnet.berkeley.edu> Date: 4 May 89 17:00:06 GMT References: Sender: daemon@ucbvax.BERKELEY.EDU Organization: The Internet Lines: 32 I have to agree with Andy Maas' assessment of POP and his comments concerning the recent posting by Billy Brackenridge. I can understand that POP may not have been a smashing success some time ago. But perhaps this was due to inadequacies in the implementation. The value in POP lies in the fact that it is a network protocol that is independant of an underlying file structure. In other words, POP clients and servers can be implemented on a variety of architectures and (if true to the protocol) can communicate with one another irregardless of the platform. Some people have criticized POP because they are unhappy with the Rand POP server implementation. Since Rand mh 6.6 does not completely meet our needs, we are looking at developing our own POP server, more tightly coupled with existing BSD 4.3 features (e.g., use password file for authentication, access mail spool instead of separate spool area, etc.) Because this is a protocol-based approach to mail, we know we can continue using the Stanford MacMH program with our server, should we develop one. Furthermore, as MacTCP and TCPort become more widespread, I expect we will see alternate POP client implementations. Again, for those not completely satisfied with MacMH, alternative client interfaces can be developed based on POP that will communicate with the POP server(s). The point is that you really have to look at the advantages of a protocol-based approach to mail services independent from existing implementations. Austin Shelton Data Communication and Network Services University of California at Berkeley