[2475] in SIPB bug reports
pfrom
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Calvin Clark)
Sat Feb 15 20:07:52 1992
Date: Sat, 15 Feb 92 20:07:21 -0500
From: Calvin Clark <ckclark@mit.edu>
To: bug-sipb@Athena.MIT.EDU
Reply-To: ckclark@mit.edu
I fixed the version of pfrom in the SIPB locker to use TOP instead of
RETR. (See [8971] in bugs for the fix I submitted for the Athena from.)
This will reduce load on the network and the post offices, and will make
the program run faster in general, because it will only have to retrieve
the headers, and not the whole message.
I installed the fixed versions for the vax, decmips, and rt. I spent a
few minutes trying to port pfrom to the RS/6000, but I thought it was
pointless, because many of the changes I would have made have already
been made in the Athena from. This raises some questions.
1. Why is pfrom still in the SIPB locker?
Presumably this is because many users have it hardcoded in their
dotfiles, or because no one has yet taken the initiative to remove it.
2. What should be done with it?
Should we still keep this version? A lot of work was put into the
Athena version, which supports checking local mail as well as pop mail.
Should we just make symlinks to the Athena from? Should we replace it
with a script? Should we keep it maintained, so that we can make
improvements and have a version which will eventually be better than the
one currently in the Athena release? If so, who wants to champion this
cause? What's the deal?
Note that the Athena from has a hook in it so that the postmasters can
prevent requests when the POP servers are heavily loaded (it checks a
couple of files in AFSland.) The sipb version does not. Should we be
providing it in this state?
-Calvin
