ml>  MvanL> That's my point - they opted for the current style. I think the 
 ml>  MvanL> Maximus style is better.

 ml> i still don't understand what you are calling "style"??

In Maximus 3.x you can do things like this: 

                   filearea 2
                        acs         demoted
                        desc        Opus v1.79 (May 1st, 1997)
                        download    m:\base\filebase\lcl\bbs\software\opus\v1.79
                        upload      m:\base\filebase\uploads
                    end filearea

                    filearea tools
                        acs         demoted
                        desc        Opus v1.79 (May 1st, 1997)
                        download   
m:\base\filebase\lcl\bbs\software\opus\v1.79\tools
                        upload      m:\base\filebase\uploads
                    end filearea

                ; end .lcl.bbs.soft.opus
                filedivisionend

                filedivisionbegin iniq demoted . Iniquity

                filearea 1
                    acs         limited
                    desc        Iniquity program files and source code
                    download    m:\base\filebase\lcl\bbs\software\iniquity
                    upload      m:\base\filebase\uploads
                end filearea
        
            ; end .lcl.bbs.soft.iniq
            filedivisionend

        ; end .lcl.bbs.soft
        filedivisionend

    filedivisionbegin dailey demoted . johndaileysoftware.com

        filearea 1
            acs         normal
            desc        BBS Doors
            download    m:\base\filebase\lcl\bbs\doors\dailey\doors
            upload      m:\base\filebase\uploads
        end filearea

            ...
            ...
            ...

    ; end .lcl.bbs.dailey
    filedivisionend

; end .lcl.bbs
filedivisionend

You can nest as deep as you want, and file areas can represent your
physical directory structure on disk which makes sorting and organising
files more natural.

Which ends up looking like this when they're displayed: 

============================================================================
    File Areas --------------

        lcl.bbs.1            ... Fidonet nodelists and policies
        ...
        ...
        ...
        lcl.bbs.soft         ... BBS Software
        lcl.bbs.dailey       ... johndaileysoftware.com

        For more areas, type ".." to go up one level or
"/" for top level areas.
        
    File area (Area, "["=Prior, "]"=Next, "?"=List):
============================================================================

And at the "File area (Area..." prompt users can enter atomic
paths to switch file or message areas eg.:

    File area (Area, "["=Prior, "]"=Next,
"?"=List): lcl.bbs.soft.opus.tools

instead of typing in meaningless numbers when displaying "groups &
subgroups" while switching areas etc.

To my knowledge the Synchronet & RA-style only allows a two-level
breakdown of file & message areas into groups & subgroups. That's
crap. imo.

 ml>  MvanL> I'm not fully purposely descending into a BBS software war, 

 ml> me either... i'm just trying to figure out what you are 
 ml> trying to describe and respond to that...

[...]

 ml> hunh?? nonono... i'm talking about joe sysop and john sysop who both 
 ml> download the same bbs software and install it without any modification 
 ml> using all the default screens and menus... users to 
 ml> their boards see the same presentation... now, one of 
 ml> those users calls fred sysop's bbs which is also 
 ml> running the exact same software but fred has taken the time to
"skin it" 
 ml> by making his own screens... next door to fred, is alex 
 ml> who also runs the same bbs software... alex has gone 
 ml> even further because he has found the menu editor and 
 ml> come up with his own menu keys and option layouts... 
 ml> alex comes from an old mainframe style world where 
 ml> everything is chosen from menus of no more then ten 
 ml> (10) options... that makes it very easy cause there's 
 ml> only 0-9 to hit but it makes it more complicated 
 ml> because now there have to be dozens more menu screens...

 ml> none of the above have "hacked" anything or had to work 
 ml> around any problems as there are none... now, the 
 ml> callers, on the other hand, may be a bit confused or 
 ml> maybe not...

Yeah. Well to draw distinctions between BBS software it's more comparable
to compare the standard features (excluding mods and plugins). That's the
approach I use, until people/authors start cheating by distributing plugins
& modules as part of thier "standard" package which is
arguably misrepresenting practice to me :)

 ml>  MvanL> For example it'd be a nightmare to mimmick the Maximus area
 ml>  MvanL> divisioning behaviour in Synchronet / RA where areas are
 ml>  MvanL> numerically defined instead of alphanumerically capable.

 ml> but it isn't all that hard... one could easily do it with a script... but 

When BBS functions/functionalities are not part of the BBS binary, or
outside the source code that's cheating.

 ml> yes, alphanumeric access to an area may be easier for 
 ml> some... but it also all depends on what you get used 
 ml> to, too... i have to wonder, though, at what happens 
 ml> when things are moved around and reorganized... with RA, there are two 

Well one day I'm going to add environment variables to Maximus control files
baby. Add a preprocessor to Silt that translates Operating System
environment variables and/or #define directives in Maximus Ctl files.

If I want to change or move things around, just change a global variable.

eg. 

  C:\> set bbsdrive=M:

  Filereas.Ctl: 

    #define   BASE        \base\filebase
    #define   UPLOAD_DIR  %%bbsdrive%%\BASE
  
    filearea 1
        acs         normal
        desc        BBS Doors
        download    BASE\lcl\bbs\doors\dailey\doors
        upload      UPLOAD_DIR
    end filearea

MuahaHAHA (evil laugh).

 ml> numbers with each area... one used for display and the 
 ml> other used behind the scenes for the record number of 
 ml> the area definition as well as the datafile names... so 
 ml> i can "renumber" my areas without changing anything and
external software 
 ml> won't loose track as long as they go by the proper id 
 ml> number... this type of thing also comes into play with 
 ml> offline mail setups... in the past, if a sysop added 
 ml> new areas by inserting them instead of appending them, 
 ml> users who downloaded offline mail before the change and 
 ml> uploaded after the change would inevitably get some 
 ml> messages posted to the wrong message areas thru no 
 ml> fault of their own... no fault, really, of the sysop, 
 ml> either... many folk like to see stuff alphabetically 
 ml> instead of in arrival order...

What you've described is the limitation of numerically based area
definitions, which necessitates use of an internal ID number to maintain
consistency when inserting new or reordering areas. 

In Maximus any file or message area can be given a unique definition or
label so there're no clashes. They work like domain names, so the
label/area itself acts like a RA equivalent internal ID number. If I wanted
to reorder an area I just cut & paste a block definition somewhere
else.

Should the need to increment "numbers" arises I'd have to resort
to a sed/awk script or something. 

But then again, Maximus can implement the TAG keyword for filearea
definitions since it already supports it for message areas. This would
solve all perceivable problems and allow external programs to differentiate
between areas that have the SAME number in the SAME "subgroup".
Sort of how Squish and areas.bbs works with universal static echoarea tags.

I'll add it to the todos list. Heh.

All this flexibility stems from Maximus' native support for alphanumeric
area definitions.

[...]

 ml> apparently you don't have all the facts, either... bob 
 ml> jones is limited by a job contract in what he can do as 
 ml> far as developing and coding anything... the 
 ml> limitations of that contract are almost expired... 
 ml> until that expiration time passes, he felt that it was 
 ml> safer for the existing code to not be handled by 
 ml> himself so that it would not be misclassified and have 
 ml> that company he was contracted with trying to claim it 
 ml> for their own...

 ml>  MvanL> I remember that thread. 

 ml> it didn't seem that you did...

I don't lead-in my messages/replies with disclaimers and clauses. It's all
assumed knowledge unless there's blatant ignorance or misinformation has
occurred.

 ml>  MvanL> I appreciate all efforts and contributions towards Maximus.

 ml>  MvanL> That doesn't change the fact that there has been nothing new 
 ml>  MvanL> since 2003, 

 ml> what do you expect to see as a new feature?

Here's my wishlist so far:

 Directory of M:\todos\dev

05/05/2007  13:34                 .
05/05/2007  13:34                 ..
05/05/2007  13:40                  459 add.division_indicators.txt
13/10/2006  17:06                  277 add.ip_number_in_(xxx)_yyy-zzzz_format.txt
21/09/2006  22:25                  129 add.msgdivision_mail_indicator.txt
23/10/2006  07:15                  346 add.msg_browse_list_date.txt
16/04/2007  03:39                  198 add.tags.filename_wildcards.txt
23/10/2006  06:10                  214 add.tags.list_tagged_areas.txt
10/04/2007  05:39                1,899 add.useredit.number_of_total.txt
16/10/2006  11:37                   56 add.wfc_node_number.txt
10/04/2007  09:26                3,283 bug.change_squish_message.txt
22/10/2006  11:05                  718 bug.msg_ptrs.txt
05/05/2007  12:39                  791 enhance.files.bbs_line_limit.txt
30/12/2006  08:49                  133 enhance.files.download_limit.txt
11/04/2007  08:35                  478 enhance.files.locate.txt
30/12/2006  09:12                   64 enhance.files.scroll_listing.txt
27/12/2006  06:16                  459 enhance.menus.selection_char_position.txt
16/04/2007  03:54                  409 enhance.msgs.browse.txt
05/05/2007  13:43                  219 enhance.msgs.multiple_editors.txt
11/04/2007  08:57                  376 enhance.msgs.search_echotags.txt
16/04/2007  03:55                  369 enhance.msgs.search_echotags2.txt
29/04/2007  11:43                  441 enhance.msgs.txt
02/05/2007  21:52                  476 enhance.timeout.txt
13/10/2006  17:13                  506 fix.make_guest_reconfig_optional.txt
18/11/2006  08:22                  501 misc.Future_Version_roadmap.txt
17/11/2006  15:22                  146 new.+ice_2_mexchat.txt
17/10/2006  09:47                  113 new.door32sys.txt
28/04/2007  09:02               65,717
new.exitinfobbs_dropfile.src-sbbs3-xtrn_sec_cpp - view - 1_55.mht
27/12/2006  06:03                  347 new.global_menus.txt
16/04/2007  04:01                  286 new.login_by_usr#.txt
12/10/2006  01:31                   69 new.long_filenames.txt
11/04/2007  09:00                  797 README.TXT
13/10/2006  17:09                  421 svr.ftp.txt
12/10/2006  01:43                   94 svr.http.txt
18/11/2006  08:17                   23 svr.smtp.txt
28/04/2007  10:00                1,997 util.silt.txt
27/04/2007  20:37                1,271 util.silt.txt~
              34 File(s)         83,404 bytes
               2 Dir(s)     865,581,056 bytes f

Anybody up for it ? 

Heh.

[...]

 ml> you can't blame bob for what happened to him WRT that 
 ml> job he took... truth is that most bbs software is a one 
 ml> man endevor and always has been... i'm aware of only 
 ml> two or three packages that were more than one person 
 ml> teams but every one of them started as a one person 
 ml> project... two of those are dead and gone and another 
 ml> has gone back to a one person endevor...

I'm dissing the lack of progress on Maximus. But I'm blaming noone.

There're about 5 people working on Synchronet.

I agree with Andrew Clarke's post about attitudes to OSS. Either pay
someone to do it or go DIY.

When VMware doesn't work anymore I'll have to pay a whole team to port it to
another platform using MVC++ or something. Who knows.

I might even contract Rob Swindell =P

--- Maximus/2 3.01