>> right... MBUNLOCK.NOW is a semaphore used to signal that
 >> another task wants the _hudson_ message base for a
 >> moment... the task locking the base should pause its
 >> operations and release the base to allow the requesting
 >> task access...

 MvdV> I thought it was something like that.

i remember when it first came out... originally i thought it was kinda
silly but over the years, i've mellowed a bit ;)

 >> it is a(nother) contribution from gerard van der land, the gecho
 >> author, and is designed to allow the HMB to be easier used in a
 >> multitasking/multinode setup...

 MvdV> Pity he never submitted the documentation to the FTSC
 MvdV> though....

i can do that, i guess... the doc is released to all and sundry...

 >> previously, there wasn't any sort of locking capability
 >> built with the HMB... any that existed were created and
 >> maintained by the author of the util performing such (ie: a
 >> bbs might put a byte lock on one of its files signaling
 >> that it had the HMB locked)...

 MvdV> Well, it seems than that FM and Fmail don't work well together
 MvdV> on this issue. FM cerates the semaphore, Fmail recognises it,
 MvdV> but something goes wrong between the two. :-(

ummm... do you have fmail set for "message base sharing"?? try
toggling that the other way and see what happens... does your setup
actually have more than one app accessing the message bases at any time?

 MvdV> Perhaps Gecho will work better in combination with FM, but
 MvdV> there is no way I am going back to Gecho. That way I'll just
 MvdV> reintroduce the problems that were the reason for dumping it
 MvdV> in favour of Fmail 10 years ago...

yeah, no doubt... there is that other tosser, FE, too ;)

 >> more information is available in the RALCK003 (an ASCII text
 >> file on my site with a .DOC extension, located in area 10, "LOCAL:
 >> RemoteAccess Related")...

 MvdV> Ok, thanks.

 MvdV> I'll have a look at it when I have some spare time.

i dunno if i need to really do anything to it to post it to the FTSC... i
think i'll drop it in there as it is and see what feedback i get...

 >>  MvdV> Or perhaps I could RTFM. ;-)

 >> it may be in there! O:)  i know that a lot of work was done
 >> on those docs and there is even a FAQ file available... i'm
 >> confident that you saw that stuff on your visit to my system...

 MvdV> Yes, I did. Downloaded some of it, Know where to find the rest
 MvdV> if I need it...

cool...

 MvdV> I am not sure if I will continue on this path however. If I
 MvdV> can't make FM do quoting of initials - one way or another - I
 MvdV> will move on. I had to take quit a lot of flak over using an
 MvdV> editor that does not support it and I feel they do have a
 MvdV> point - in part.

yes, they do but geez... some folk fuss just to fuss, ya know...

 MvdV> So if I am going to change editors, it will to one that
 MvdV> supports quoting of initials. Among other things. CHAR kludge
 MvdV> support being one of them. I write in German areas and there
 MvdV> it is sort of a must...

hummm... you might want to take a look at the original TimED, then... not
the newer stuff that andrew clarke has done... i've the original TimED and
the one or two y2k patches by the snooze editor available... TimED does
initials and has character mappings and such... i hear decent things about
golded, too, but i've never played with it... the reason i say to look at
the older version of TimED is because andrew doesn't do JAM so the JAM
stuff doesn't work in the latest stuff... and i don't know C and so i've
not dug into it, either... i won't even mention life outside fido ;)

)\/(ark