Newsgroups: news.software.b Path: utzoo!utstat!geoff From: geoff@utstat.uucp (Geoff Collyer) Subject: Re: C news compatibility (was Re: Patch dates or Patch Numbers) Message-ID: <1989Aug19.051306.3742@utstat.uucp> Organization: Statistics, U. of Toronto References: <1989Aug9.164003.20669@utzoo.uucp> <6717@dayton.UUCP> <1989Aug19.004434.29961@utstat.uucp> <64167@uunet.UU.NET> Date: Sat, 19 Aug 89 05:13:06 GMT Pardon me, I did mean "de jure", not "de facto". > Something is backwards compatible when you can replace an older system > with it and things keep running. > If you could remove all of the Bnews executables and replace them > with Cnews and the system kept running, then it would be backwards > compatible. Clearly you can not do that. Therefore, clearly it is not backwards > compatible. Using your definition of "backwards compatible", we have never intended to claim that C news is completely backwards compatible with B news. You cannot just remove your B news binaries and install C news and have nothing break, though we believe that most things will continue to work. > Messageids are case independant. Period. You intentionally ignore it > with some sleazy rationalization about its not being in the RFC. > The RFC is wrong. My name is on the RFC. I think that lets me > say with some authority whether the RFC is wrong or not. We did not cite "some sleazy rationalization", we cited RFC 822, which RFC 1036 claims takes precedence in case of a disagreement. RFC 822 says that local-parts are case-sensitive. Are you now saying that 822 does not take precedence over 1036 in general or just in this one case? > Jesus. Would you drop your damned "bnews sucks" campaign. I did not say "bnews sucks" and perhaps I should not have said "horrible". It's tricky to talk about news performance without offending. > Why dont you just admit that you did a better, but non-backwards compatible > implementation? There is nothing wrong with that. Okay, by your definition of "backwards compatible", we wrote a better, but not-completely-backwards-compatible news implementation. -- Geoff Collyer utzoo!utstat!geoff, geoff@utstat.toronto.edu