Frank Cox wrote in a message to Trev Roydhouse:
 >> Will this new release still use only *.msg format?  
 > Yes. If you want something else in the future, please advise 
 > the OOWK.  
 FC> My 2 cents worth on this:  The *.MSG format has many things going
 FC> for it, not the least of which is simplicity, which equates to ease
 FC> of access to each message for utility authors.  I'd rather write a
 FC> utility and concentrate on getting the utility to work right than
 FC> have to spend days figuring out how to access and read a message
 FC> text, let alone figuring out how to add or delete a message from
 FC> some fancy-dan database.  (The offset from the last accessed
 FC> message is stored where?  And if I change it, then what else goes
 FC> kerflup?)  And the *.MSG format is relatively bulletproof; data
 FC> corruption of whatever kind generally affects only one message
 FC> rather than an entire message area (or the whole message database).
 FC> The main objection to the *.MSG format, i.e. it wastes space, is
 FC> really kind of a non-issue with today's large hard drives and the
 FC> wide availability of software like DOUBLESPACE for folks who need
 FC> to squeeze every possible message into a smaller space.
Frank, it's more than just what you've stated.  When you get 300-400 *.msg 
messages in a DOS file subdivision, access s l o w s down to a crawl.  
Also, with today's larger hard drives, if you're using the max DOS 2 Gig 
drive (without partitioning it into smaller logical drives), each message 
(even if it's only 500 bytes in size) will take up 32K of disk space because 
that's the minimum DOS cluster size on a 2 Gig drive.
The "database" approach used by Squish & Doug Boone's variant has many 
advantages, the ability to manipulate the messages in the database certainly 
isn't as trivial as with the *.msg format, but since when is the easiest 
route the best?
                                   - Bob
Internet  : bob@juge.com
Telnet, Vmodem, WWW or FTP to juge.com
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