Yo! John:
Sunday June 22 1997 02:31, John Hoyt wrote to Bill Cheek:
 BJ>> I should be flying that, since I switched to Platinum Xpress.
 BJ>> ViaMail also isn't listed, nor are a dozen other mailers that are
 BJ>> now common.
 BC>> Ummm hummmmm......and THAT alone speaks rather loudly of the state of
 BC>> affairs, don't you think?  Fido can't even keep things current.........
 JH> Bill, why should anyone in fido administration have to go out in search 
of
 JH> new software and their capabilities?  It is up to each developer to send
 JH> in that info themselves.  If they can't be bothered to update it, then
 JH> they don't deserve to be listed in the examples.
Right.  But since 'profitability' for new software is contingent, at least in 
part, on its listing and classification in the nodelist, one would THINK that 
new developments would be aggressively sent to the "fido administration". 
There's more reason to submit that to be the case than supposing these 
developers are waiting for Fido to come to them.  The latter is silly.  The 
former is likely.
 JH> And again, that info we are referring to in the nodelist is just
 JH> that. EXAMPLES.  The full list of PIDs (product IDs) is in another
 JH> document, but that document does not list the capabilities of each
 JH> program either.
No, it doesn't.  But it is pretty clear as to what software is indigenous to 
the Mac platform.
 JH> Getting away from fidonet (and from the scanning hobby even further),
 JH> tell me how I can find out what computer a web site or an IRC server
 JH> is running on?  Unless they are flying something to indicate as much,
 JH> there is no way to tell whether it is running on a Sun, Dec, Mac,
 JH> Amiga, or a Cray...
 JH> Which speaks rather LOUDLY itself...
Ohhhhhh nooooooo.....there are ways to tell what's doing what.  There is no 
single way; rather a combination of detective techniques can tell a lot about 
a given site.  One example is to hit a known site with a request for a 
nonexistent page to get an error flash.  That error return often tells a lot 
about the site, especially if it uses a proxy server.  FTP'ing a site often 
discloses a lot about the machine.  It's strictly seat-of-the-pants, but 
indeed, you CAN tell a lot about a given site and its machine.
Bill Cheek ~ E-mail: bcheek@san.rr.com
Windows 95 Juggernaut Team ~ Microsoft MVP
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