🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1glp8dINN4sc@rodan.UU.NET> avg@rodan.UU.NET (Vadim Antonov) writes:

>Look, if you're not using anything but ASCII "just send 8 bits"
>works just fine. If you have an old software and want to get
>extended character set you can't do it anyway, right?

Nope.  If you only use ASCII, by definition (ANSI X3.4-1986), you are
never sending 8 bits.  Moreover, news uses a flooding algorithm rather
than anything resembling routing, so even a 6-bit or 7-bit site will
(eventually) receive an 8-bit message that might crash it.  In the case
of email, receiving the wrong 8-bit character on the wrong machine is
_known_ to crash it.

>If the vendor-software crashes on, say, a file with 1025-byte line
>it's a bug, isn't it? If a program craches on ANYTHING it's a bug.
>A bug is a bug is a bug. Call their tech support and have them to
>fix it.

  In many cases the vendor doesn't exist and source code isn't
available and so it _cannot_ be fixed.  Also recall that USENET is
transported over weird links, not just UUCP and NNTP.

>"Just send 8 bits" *is* backward compatible. Check your logic.

Nope.  With email will crash other folks' machines, which is at least
highly anti-social and possibly down right malicious.  With news that
same thing might happen.

>Then why on the Earth did you upgrade your software the last time?

Many of the hosts in question _haven't_ upgraded their software in
years because they cannot upgrade their software -- which is why there
is _still_ a hosts.txt at nic.ddn.mil.

Ran
atkinson@itd.nrl.navy.mil