Acbosgd.2173
net.news.b
utcsrgv!utzoo!decvax!duke!harpo!cbosg!cbosgd!mark
Thu Mar 25 13:58:09 1982
Re:  net.general.ctl
From: mark (Mark Horton)
	From cbosg!ihnss!ihps3!stolaf!hastings Thu Mar 25 12:46:07 1982
	Date: 25-Mar-82 11:13:07-EST (Thu)
	From: cbosg!ihnss!ihps3!stolaf!hastings
	Subject: net.general.ctl
	Via: cbosgd.uucp (V3.73 [1/5/82]); 25-Mar-82 12:46:07-EST (Thu)
	Mail-From: cbosg received by cbosgd at 25-Mar-82 12:46:05-EST (Thu)
	To: ihps3!ihnss!cbosg!cbosgd!mark

	Say, Mark, what's the straight poop on SYSWIDE in readr.c?  Do
	you want it defined or no?
SYSWIDE should be defined, but you can turn it off if you want to have
local only cancelling of articles.  In 2.4 there will be a runtime check,
since, while it's harmless to send out a network wide cancel message
for a local article, it's unnecessary and wasteful.
	Rnews as distributed has a problem
	with control messages:  when is_ctl is set, the header hasn't
	been read yet, so is_ctl never gets set in rnews.  I fixed it
	by moving the code to test for is_ctl several places in the
	ensuing if..else if...else code, making it appropriate for each
	case.
That was a bug in 2.2.  The fix is to duplicate the is_ctl test ONCE,
inside the mode==PROC case, after the call to ngcat.  It was fixed in 2.3.
In general, there were lots of bugs in 2.2 - anyone running 2.2 should
convert to 2.3 ASAP.  If you're missing the diff let me know and I'll
mail it - it was posted to net.sources about a week ago.  There are
also public copies of 2.3 in several major machines in ~uucp/news.tar.

	Several administrators I have spoken with were confused by the
	ctl messages flying around... perhaps you could enlighten us?
Glad to.  Any message matching all.all.ctl is a control message.
Currently some messages are going to net.general.ctl - that will be
changed to net.msg.ctl in 2.4 to make life easier on those systems that
haven't converted yet.  But I do strongly recommend that all sites
convert to a released B news, that is 2.3 or newer.  2.3 has several minor
bugs but nothing major has surfaced.  It seems to be healthy enough to
install with no qualms.

If you continue to run a B prerelease or an A news, you will get stored
copies of all control messages, which your users probably would rather
not see.   This is the main reason I urge conversion.  If you have a
great deal of local mods, let Matt know about them (ucbvax!arpavax:usenet)
and if you do the coding in a current B news, chances are good they will
be bought back.

	Mark

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