The debian-private mailing list leak, part 1. Volunteers have complained about Blackmail. Lynchings. Character assassination. Defamation. Cyberbullying. Volunteers who gave many years of their lives are picked out at random for cruel social experiments. The former DPL's girlfriend Molly de Blanc is given volunteers to experiment on for her crazy talks. These volunteers never consented to be used like lab rats. We don't either. debian-private can no longer be a safe space for the cabal. Let these monsters have nowhere to hide. Volunteers are not disposable. We stand with the victims.
[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: msdos-i386 directory...

On 31 May 1997, Kai Henningsen wrote:

<stuff deleted that I pretty much agree with>

> I just made a quick test. The OS/2 commandline FTP client has absolutely  
> no problems fetching symlinked files from ftp.debian.org (even with mget);  
> the GUI variant (FTPPM) fails miserably to do anything useful (that is, it  
> only produces error messages), because it can't parse the directory  
> listing. (Interestingly enough, symlinked directories work just fine.) Of  
> course, OS/2 could use long file names just fine on a HPFS partition :-)
> 
> GUI FTP clients are evil.
> 
You have hit the nail on the head! This is exactly the reason it crops up
with "novice" computer users and Windows-heads. The only DOS ftp client I
have ever used, and the one most often to report the links problem is the
Trumpet-Winsock FTP client. (and that experience is several years out of
date)

The problem is that before we can educate these users about the evils of
the various clients we have to get them to listen.. For this class of
newbee their first attempt to "listen" to us is going to yield "no
message".

It seems to me that the major strength of Linux, and the Free Software
Community in general, is its desire to support; every known file system,
every odd-ball device, and cater to the idiosyncrasies of the other
operating systems it comes in contact with. It is, I believe, the fact
that this philosophy is in such diametric opposition to the philosophy of
the "Software Corporations", that makes Linux capable of competing head to
head in certain environments.

To the extent that Debian follows that inclusive policy, it can compete in
its niche more effectively. In light of this, I don't think that saying
"the other guy's software is broken" is a productive solution. On the
other hand, I'm not convinced that trying to screw around with the
symlinks in the archive is a productive method either. I can solve it on
the CDs I produce by converting the symlinks to hard links, but I don't
believe that this is appropriate on the ftp archive.

Maybe the best solution is to find a DOS Freeware FTP client that "does
the right thing" and provide it in tools (or anywhere, as long as it is a
file and not a symlink). Then folks with the "broken" clients can first
download the "good one" and then use it to get their own DOS archive. It's
one more thing to have to worry about advertising somewhere, but it, at
least, provides an alternative doorway into the system.

Waiting is,

Dwarf
-- 
_-_-_-_-_-_-                                          _-_-_-_-_-_-_-

aka   Dale Scheetz                   Phone:   1 (904) 656-9769
      Flexible Software              11000 McCrackin Road
      e-mail:  dwarf@polaris.net     Tallahassee, FL  32308

_-_-_-_-_-_- If you don't see what you want, just ask _-_-_-_-_-_-_-


--
TO UNSUBSCRIBE FROM THIS MAILING LIST: e-mail the word "unsubscribe" to
debian-private-request@lists.debian.org . 
Trouble?  e-mail to templin@bucknell.edu .