Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84 SMI; site sun.uucp Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!decwrl!sun!gnu From: gnu@sun.uucp (John Gilmore) Newsgroups: net.news Subject: Re: Helpfulness, environment vars, .newsrc, ideas Message-ID: <1746@sun.uucp> Date: Tue, 16-Oct-84 00:03:37 EDT Article-I.D.: sun.1746 Posted: Tue Oct 16 00:03:37 1984 Date-Received: Wed, 17-Oct-84 09:02:39 EDT References: <890@opus.UUCP> <1578@nsc.UUCP> Organization: Sun Microsystems, Inc. Lines: 26 > > The business of tucking a copy of your posting into author.copy is another > > feature I could do without. > Also fixed, originally by Mark at Fortune, and I've hacked it further. My > version (also at poor, overworked rick's house) doesn't save the message > (following the true unix standard of doing nothing and saying nothing > unless asked) unless you set an environment variable. I haven't figured out > how to deal with YA environment variable due to lack of time, but I'll > probably get frustrated enough one of these days... Ahem, there's a good place for these options...it's called .newsrc . That's where all the other news options go. I know it's a true unix standard for each program to do its options differently but we could bend the standard just this once. While I'm here, can I suggest more helpful things that readnews could do? (0) Handle the HUP signal by Quitting, so you don't lose hours of reading time when 3-way calling rears its head, or you kick the phone by accident. (1) Checkpoint itself every N messages (optionally) so you don't lose hours of reading time (or have to muck in the core file) when a system crash or bug (or HUP) kills your session. (2) In vnews, accept Backspace to back up (screens or messages), just like Space moves you forward.