Hi mark.

06-Jul-02 09:28:50, mark lewis wrote to Jasen Betts


 JB>> Hi mark. subj. tell me more.

 ml> here's what i had spoken of some years ago...

It's long, and I've replied as I went... so I may have duplicated some of
your ideas...

 ml> i'd love to be able to list all my capabilities on my main address
 ml> and any AKAs that need it... that'd mean that we'd need another
 ml> "phone" field... the nodelist does need a "bit"
of reworking but i
 ml> don't see it as reducing the size of it..

Are there filesize issues with the nodelist?

IIRC most of the issues with the nodelist in the FIDONEWS thread were
problems with it just not working.

As I see it the nodelist is mainly a list of all the nodes in fidonet so
giving their identieies and  contact information that they can be
crashmailed

It's not really needed for routed netmail, or for echomail etc which is
basically just passed node to node (to pass for echomail and netmail you
only need to know your neighbours)


 ml> ie: maybe something like this... //wrapped for clarity

 ml>  ,12,Waldo's_Place_USA,Sanford_NC,Mark_Lewis,CM,XA,-//
 ml>  ,1-919-774-5930,V32b,V42b,H16,V32t,V34,-//
 ml>  ,bbs.wpusa.dynip.com,ITN,IVM,-//
 ml>  ,USDS,PITA,PIZZA

so basically a identificaation block followed by connection
blocks, and a flags block (but all on one line)

 ml> basically, moving the CM,MO and mailer capability flags to after
 ml> the sysop name... a ,-,

I think the CM flag belongs with the connection - say if someone only has
the POTS line available at night but has internet up 24 hours.

maybe allow flags in the ID block there but also allow them to be
overridden in the connection block

 ml> field to denote modem section with same
 ml> format as in use today... a ,-, field to denote IP capability
 ml> section with domain or IP address and new IP capability flags...
 ml> and a final ,-, seperator field that would either end the line or
 ml> into the user flags section..

 ml> a POTS only system would look like...

 ml> ,12,Waldo's_Place_USA,Sanford_NC,Mark_Lewis,CM,XA,-,//
 ml> 1-919-774-5930,V32b,V42b,H16,V32t,V34,-,,-,USDS,PITA,PIZZA

nah. i don't like it. (I see you have better solutions later)

What if someone has internet, ISDN and two phone lines.
why limit the connection blocks,

 ml> with one empty field where all the IP stuff would be... an IP
 ml> only, continous mail, mail only system would look like..

 ml> of course, a system with no POTS or IP or userflags would simply
 ml> be...

 ml> ,12,Waldo's_Place_USA,Sanford_NC,Mark_Lewis,-,,-,,-,,

 ml> -=%*)

no PVT flag ? (i guess it's not really needed)

 ml> the first problem i see is one of line length unless we also
 ml> implement something like the above //wrapped style..

yeah, definately, why not make it the law:
how about this instead.

any reason why the userflags can't follow the identity line.

 DM>> However, the standard could be written so that software
 DM>> developers know the direction we're headed and nodes would know
 DM>> what future upgrades might be necessary.

 ml> i'm sure the developers will already know what direction folks
 ml> want to head off in long before any work on documenting anything
 ml> gets started >

too true :(

 ml> maybe i should go ahead and document what i've just proposed and
 ml> present it to some mailer developers for feedback and
 ml> adjustment... then to the FTSC after the necessary nodelist
 ml> manipluation tools are in use... i see no difference in this and
 ml> the switch to the current St. Louis format back in '85... maybe
 ml> i'll call it the ESL nodelist format... ;-)

 ml> then again, i dunno... whatever we come up with must be
 ml> extensible... the above will run into a linelength problem, i'm
 ml> sure...

I think it's be better to document line length as unlimitted and leave it
to the developers to implement it. C compilers for instance don't have any
problems with line length (thst is,C progams can have lines of any length.)

 ml> we could do a multiline format... off the top of my head,
 ml> maybe something like this... again with the //wrappin

back in 1980 comma delimeted lists were the last word in open data formats.
these days we have better tools

maybe some osrt of structured language would be more flexible?

-- break---

 ml> POTS,Host,3634,Fayetteville_Net_(039),Sanford_NC,Mark_Lewis,//
 ml> 1-919-774-5930,33600,CM,XA,V32b,V42b,H16,V32t,V34
 ml> IP,,,,,,000-012-146-166-242,,CM,XA,ITN,IVM, IP,,,,,,,,MO,CM,XX,IBN

 ml> POTS,Node,12,Waldo's_Place_USA,central_north_carolina_usa,//
 ml> mark_lewis,1-919-774-5930,33600,CM,XA,V32b,V42b,H16,V32t,V34
 ml> IP,,,bbs.wpusa.dynip.com,,,000-012-146-242,,CM,XA,ITN,IVM,IBN
 ml> IP,,,,,,,,LO,MO,CM,XX,IBN

all those empty fields makes it hard to read, and escpcially hard to find
mistakes by eye.

 ml> fields are left empty... essentially, what we are doing is
 ml> "overriding" those fields that are different and everything is
 ml> built from the first entry..

 ml> you'll notice that i'm allowing for multiple IP lines...this
 ml> answers the FREQ flags "problem" and also allows for one to
 ml> indicate, as i did above, that the IBN connection can't pass the
 ml> connection off to a bbs (the MO flag)...

yeah...

 ml> this format appears to be more extensible and easier to work
 ml> with... for one thing, it's easy enough for a utility tool to
 ml> build a SLF nodelist from the above...

a most important feature...

 ml> that utility tool could be
 ml> crafted to handle special situations like ION nets/hosts/regions
 ml> in some manner that POTS nodes could still verify their existance
 ml> (some systems won't pass mail unless the destination system is in
 ml> their nodelist) and be able to route mail to(ward) them..

that way existing nodes could keep their old mailers (and nodelist tools)
and if the nodelist extraction tool is smart enough it could
extract the useful information only,

People with IP capabilities could set it to extract the IP information into
a SLF nodelist id a form that their mailer understands (IP in the phone
field)  and those whose mailers are confused by by that could set it to
put unpublished there.

 -=> Bye <=-

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