Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-lcc!pyramid!octopus!pete
From: pete@octopus.UUCP (Pete Holzmann)
Newsgroups: news.admin
Subject: IDEA: reader-initiated sendme protocol
Message-ID: <270@octopus.UUCP>
Date: 30 Jun 88 19:43:51 GMT
Reply-To: pete@octopus.UUCP (Pete Holzmann)
Organization: Octopus Enterprises, Cupertino CA
Lines: 43

Maybe this is an old idea, but I think it might provide a good long-term
solution to some of our troubles:

We have an IHAVE/SENDME protocol that works automagically. Suppose that
the moderator of a particular newsgroup posted a message along the lines
of:

Archived-Name: 
Available-At:  csu-archives

This is part 1 of 10 of the new newsprogram....




The reader could respond simply by hitting the 'sendme' key. A control
message would then be forwarded towards the nearest archive site (csu-archives
being an alias for the comp.sources.unix archive sites), until it reaches
a site that either already has the message in question, or [an efficiency
improvement that might be optional at first] until the message reaches a
site that has already requested the message. In the latter case, requests
would pile up until the requested message arrives, then be filled.

This method would limit distribution of big stuff to just those sites
that request it. To make everything wonderful, we'd probably want to
add information to the sys file (and maybe the maps) regarding which paths
may be used for such distributions.

This seems like a nice combination of the best of both worlds (mailed requests
and flooding-distribution) to me. It almost seems like it could be implemented
partially on top of IHAVE/SENDME. Instead of IHave/SendMe, it is
IHave/I'llGetIt4U.

Do any of you new-news-version-implementors have any idea whether this, or
some useful subset, is implementable without too much pain?

Or is this just pie in the sky?

Pete
-- 
  OOO   __| ___      Peter Holzmann, Octopus Enterprises
 OOOOOOO___/ _______ USPS: 19611 La Mar Court, Cupertino, CA 95014
  OOOOO \___/        UUCP: {hpda,pyramid}!octopus!pete
___| \_____          Phone: 408/996-7746