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From: gordon@sneaky.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.news
Subject: Re: getting rid of Orphaned Response
Message-ID: <-1025375@sneaky.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 19-Oct-84 02:53:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: sneaky.-1025375
Posted: Fri Oct 19 02:53:00 1984
Date-Received: Tue, 23-Oct-84 01:29:13 EDT
References: <427@amd.UUCP>
Lines: 126
Nf-ID: #R:amd:-42700:sneaky:-1025375:000:6848
Nf-From: sneaky!gordon    Oct 19 01:53:00 1984

> Here's an idea I just had. My understanding of the reason news users
> get articles with "Orphaned Response" for a subject line is that
> when a msg comes into a notes system, it gets sent out with
> an "Orphaned Response" subject line if the parent (base) note isn't
> there. When the base note does come in, then users on the notes system
> get the correct subject line but their news neighbors don't edit the
> followup article's subject line even when the parent article comes in.
> 
> One approach would be for notes to hold the followup until the base
> note came in, then the followup would have the correct subject.

Contrary to some of the wording in the notes documentation, Orphaned
Responses rarely occur because "the response arrives before the base
note".  Notes does not have the equivalent of the "L" flag.  In order
to respond to a note, the note has to be at the system the response is
entered on.  From then on, the response should travel to other systems
along with or behind the base note, since if a system is going to send 
the response, it will also send the base note along with it, unless
it already sent it there earlier, the base note was written on the
destination system, or the base note was received from the destination.
The exceptions all supposedly mean that the destination already has
the base note.

There are two main reasons I know of for Orphaned responses:

Either the base note is never going to get there, because uucp or something
else trashed it, or the base note was there, but got expired before the 
response arrived.  

If everyone expires notes at two weeks, and it takes 8 days for a note 
to go across the notes net, and the response takes 8 days to get back, the 
original note will have vanished on the system it was posted on, assuming
nobody else replied (Notes expires notes based on the arrival date of the 
note or latest response.  Even with a 2-week expiration date, hot topics 
in net.flame with lots of responses can stick around for months).  The 
response shows up there as orphaned.  If that system or one close is a 
gateway, it goes into news orphaned.  Flames sent to the author of the 
response about writing an orphaned response are not going to help any, 
because the author has no idea it went out that way, nor can he/she control 
it.  

Lots of the notes systems do not run news at all.  I THINK I know who 
gateways my stuff into news, but I can't prove it.  I am not absolutely
sure that anyone does.  This also means that if my article is gatewayed by 
very dumb gateway software, I can't change it by updating my site.
(Someone want to send me a copy of this article's headers, once it gets
into news?)

Orphaned responses will occur momentarily if uucp manages to shuffle the
order of transmission of batches of notes.  However, unless "newsoutput"
(the notes -> news gateway program that calls inews) is run between the 
arrival of the second and first batch, these won't be transmitted into the 
news system as an "Orphaned Response", they will be transmitted with the 
proper title.  I doubt anyone runs newsoutput more than once an hour.
If I had to guess, I would estimate about 4 times a day.

> Another approach would be for news to go edit the followup article's
> subject line when the base note came in.

This sounds incredibly messy.  You would have to keep track of whether the
article had been orphaned, but wasn't any more, and whether the orphan had
been sent into news (no point editing if it wasn't).  You would need some way
to find the article in the news system.  Also, it would tend not to work, 
given the existing nature of news.  If inews is queueing a copy of the 
article immediately, (no batchers or U flag), then editing the header in the
gateway system would fix it for that system only.  News has no provision
for sending an update to an article using the same article-id, it would
just get dumped as a duplicate article.  If batchers or the U flag are 
being used, then the base note needs to show up before anyone transmits a 
batch or picks up the articles.  Same problem, except a bit longer window 
during which the title could be properly inserted.

Somehow I doubt that sending out a cancel message and transmitting a new 
copy of the message would be effective.  (Cancel messages tend to be 
ineffective for the same reason that updating an article would be:  you 
can take the article out of the news directory, but you can't zap the copy 
already in the uucp spool directory.  If the cancel message manages to get 
ahead of the article, it will cancel nothing, and then the article shows 
up, and stays on the system.) Mostly people would complain about seeing 
articles twice.  

> Finally, notes could avoid stripping the subject line on the followup
> when it entered the notes system. I assume that the followup has the
> correct subject line at some point because it had to be generated as
> a response to a base note and both news and notes can do that correctly.

The notes format does not contain a place for a subject line in responses.
Unless you want it duplicated in the text, which is almost as bad as
the "#" line notes used to (I think the new gateway stuff fixed this)
stick into the text of articles, there just isn't a place to put it.
All it has is a pointer to the parent article.  Changing this would cause 
considerable compatability problems and disruption because systems 
continued to run old versions.  Does this sound familiar to anyone in
news-land?  What would happen if, to meet a new standard, every news system
had to add a Line-Eater-Bug-Not-Present-At: line, or the article would
get dumped at the next site down the line?  What happens if your neighbor
insists on running news 2.6?

Also, the title is redundant information, and increases transmission time 
and disk storage.  Does news want to add Parent-Article-Subject: headers?
Also, nobody has time to modify the code, and various other excuses.

> Then again, I could be all wet in my understanding of notes.

Well, your suggestions weren't unreasonable for someone not familiar with
the innards of notes.

> It would help if people would run a modern version of uucp that
> sends things out in the order generated.

If all the files get transmitted in the same call, I don't think that
this problem causes many Orphaned Responses.  It is irritating to see 
News-originated articles with the response article immediately preceeding
the parent, (notes can't pair up an article and a reply if it wasn't a
followup, or the gateway software is stupid) but that's a different problem.
It bothers notes and news users alike.

>  Phil Ngai (408) 982-6554
>  UUCPnet: {ucbvax,decwrl,ihnp4,allegra,intelca}!amd!phil
>  ARPAnet: amd!phil@decwrl.ARPA


				Gordon Burditt
				convex!ctvax!trsvax!sneaky!gordon
				microsoft!trsvax!sneaky!gordon