ml> MvanL> * I don't like the board/sub-board (RA-style 
 ml> MvanL> group/subgroup) file/message area categorising method. 

 ml> what "RA-style group/subgroup" style? don't use it if 
 ml> you don't like it... RA didn't have it for a long time 
 ml> but it was one of the most requested functions asked 
 ml> for...

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

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

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

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

 MvanL> [...]

 ml> the biggest "problem" comes from folk who expect every 
 ml> board to be just like every other... that happens 
 ml> because they are not aware that the sysop has the 
 ml> freedom, with properly designed software, to make 
 ml> things look and act like they want and not just get 
 ml> stuck with "skinning" capabilities... 

 MvanL> Yeah but it comes at a cost whereby SysOps must hack or work 
 MvanL> around problems because their chosen BBS software doesn't 
 MvanL> inherently support those features. 

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

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

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

but it isn't all that hard... one could easily do it with a script... but
yes, alphanumeric access to an area may be easier for some... but it also
all depends on what you get used to, too... i have to wonder, though, at
what happens when things are moved around and reorganized... with RA, there
are two numbers with each area... one used for display and the other used
behind the scenes for the record number of the area definition as well as
the datafile names... so i can "renumber" my areas without
changing anything and external software won't loose track as long as they
go by the proper id number... this type of thing also comes into play with
offline mail setups... in the past, if a sysop added new areas by inserting
them instead of appending them, users who downloaded offline mail before
the change and uploaded after the change would inevitably get some messages
posted to the wrong message areas thru no fault of their own... no fault,
really, of the sysop, either... many folk like to see stuff alphabetically
instead of in arrival order...

 ml> MvanL> But Scott Dudley disappared off the face of the earth. I 
 ml> MvanL> don't blame him. So now there's only a half-arsed  
 ml> MvanL> intermittently commited ragtag user group left. 

 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...

 MvanL> I remember that thread. 

it didn't seem that you did...

 MvanL> I appreciate all efforts and contributions towards Maximus.

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

what do you expect to see as a new feature?

 MvanL> and Bob only expressed an interest in cleaning up some bugs and 
 MvanL> making a Linux installer.

i see nothing wrong with that... the original main goal was simply to get
the original code working in the *nix environment... seems to me that that
is still the goal and it simply hasn't been accomplished as of yet mainly
due to that interruption that bob faced with that contract job... 

 MvanL> Eventhough this is much (much) more than what I've done or 
 MvanL> proposed to date, it does not constitute a concerted effort to 
 MvanL> revive Maximus and therefore does not change my view of a 
 MvanL> ragtag team (if 1 person can be called a team).

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

)\/(ark