PE> Dear oh dear, he still doesn't understand.

  I'll skip the childish shit and go to the meat (if any)...

 PE> Nothing. Poor old Bob. Still doesn't understand, a year down
 PE> the track. At least you've stopped lying about what my reader
 PE> does. I guess that's a start.

  Nothing so far...

 PE> Another 80 bytes obtained from inspecting your anal passage?
 PE> Right on, Bob.
 BL> The 80 bytes comes from FTS-4... you know, the one you keep
 BL> telling me to read? "This line appears near the bottom and
 BL> gives a *small* amount of information."

 PE> Where's the 80 bytes, Bob? What do we do if it goes like this:

 PE> tearline
 PE> fred nerk was here 
 PE> Origin

  At last... something to answer.

  Reading backwards from Origin, the CR's (or CRLFs) are not
contiguous. If you find "CR--- " you know you have a false one. The
same would apply if the reader did not add an EOT and someone added
one near the top of the message. Your reader would then delete most of
the message...

  Hey! What a great idea. You could censor the users of your board by
removing the "real" EOT and adding another one just after SOT. That
way, everyone could read the messages except those using EOT readers.

 PE> The exact opposite of how you did once we chopped out your
 PE> featherbed. You lasted all of about 10 minutes when that
 PE> happened and YOU were faced with the REAL world. A REAL world
 PE> that can provide TVs a hell of a lot cheaper than you were ever
 PE> capable of. And they did then, and still do, EVEN WITH tariffs
 PE> of 5-15% against them. I look forward to the day when the 5-15
 PE> is slashed to 0 like it should be. Poor old Bob, only ever knew
 PE> how to jack up tariffs to make up for his gross incompetence.

  Nothing here...

 PE> Yeah, right. Can't rely on them getting EOT right, so best not
 PE> rely on them getting the origin right either, so ignore that.
 PE> And ignore the text too, and the header, yeah right, makes
 PE> perfect sense now.

  Close to insanity, here...

 BL> No... someone else's mailer may have added *another* kludge
 BL> line *inside* EOT. You have no control over that. 

 PE> I don't know what you're talking about. The spec governs what
 PE> the message must look like when it leaves your system.

  What don't you understand about someone and adding another EOT?
Where does it say you can't do that in FTS-1 or FTS-4 or anywhere
else? The declared purpose of EOT is to define the end of text. If 
I put in a false on and use a reader that does not add EOT, *your*
reader will truncate the message at the false EOT. It's the same 
logic for a false Tearline.

 PE> Poor old Bob.

  A telling argument. You really got me there.

 BL> If it's the first " ---" within 80 bytes of "*
Origin", it's
 BL> the
 PE> Ah, the 80 we pulled from our arse. Yeah, heard about that one.
 PE> For the first time, a couple of days ago. From a complete
 PE> idiot.

  More telling arguments. What a pity I'm adult. If I were five I'd 
be impressed by that.

 PE> What does it matter if the text is indented by 5 spaces, what
 PE> does it matter if the PATH is screwed, what does it matter if
 PE> the SEENBYs are screwed, what does it matter if the message is
 PE> all upper-cased. Poor old Bob, the whole point of a message
 PE> system is to be able to send a message, specified by the USER,
 PE> NOT the software, to the person on the other end. Sorry if that
 PE> is too much to ask for in your world of tariff-protected T-29s.

  Close to insanity again.... but no meat.

 PE> Uh oh, a "Bill Grimsley Fact" I see.

  Something for Bill now. A really strong argument in favour of
SOT/EOT. I'm convinced.

 BL> Explain to me where my logic is wrong. 
 PE> I did, many times.

  Lots of rhetoric but no data....

 BL> I explained step-by-step to Frank how to insert SOT/EOT in a
 BL> suss message, which in itself shows

 PE> And I explained step-by-step why you are a dork.

  Yes... you insulted me rather well but you didn't refute what I
said. From that I have to assume that you have no answer.

 PE> A "serious engineer" who failed miserably when he met the real
 PE> world. A "serious engineer" who couldn't think of a better way
 PE> to stop teletext flicker except by replacing every TV set in
 PE> Australia. Yeah, I've heard all about you, Bob.

  More insults...

 PE> Bob, when you disagree with me, I am very happy, because I know
 PE> I am on the right track. Just like when you said it would cost
 PE> $200 billion to fix teletext flicker, and I ignored you as a
 PE> complete dork. BFN. Paul.

  And again. Ho hum...

      *******************************************************
       My claim is this: EOT has no purpose and is a meanace
      *******************************************************
 
  If we assume that an Origin line exists...
  If we assume that both a Tearline and EOT may or may not exist:

  It is always possible to identify the true Tearline, by counting
back from the Origin (or SEEN-BY if Origin is faulty) a short line (80
bytes) as specified in FTS-4. Blank lines are ignored. The "CR--- "
found is then a true Tearline. If other lines than blank lines are
found between, the Tearline is false.

  The problem with EOT is that if it is missing (the usual case) then
the scan  backwards takes the full length of every message. It is not
possible to scan forward and combine it with the search for the null.
The undefined text could contain a EOT line. One has to scan forward
to find the null, and then backward to find the missing EOT. In the
case of no EOT (the usual case), a false one near the head of the
message will truncate the message, even conting backwards.

  If you don't answer this I assume it is because you have no answer.
Please do not write insults. I'm better at it than you but it becomes
wearing after a while.

Regards,
Bob
___ Blue Wave/QWK v2.12
@EOT:

---