toad@cellar.UUCP (Tony Shepps) (01/30/91)
A very recent article in, I think news.admin, recommends the deletion of a certain very large article in alt.fan.monty-python. This set me to wondering: if the method of deletion would be simply to rm the article, not to officially cancel it, how crucial would it be to run mkhistory to ensure an accurate history file? What bad things would happen if the file were merely missing? --------------------------------------------------------------------------- - The Cellar BBS, a responsible, kind, and caring public-access Unix site -
henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) (01/31/91)
In article <sTikw3w163w@cellar.UUCP> toad@cellar.UUCP (Tony Shepps) writes: >... if the method of deletion would be simply to rm the article, not >to officially cancel it, how crucial would it be to run mkhistory to ensure >an accurate history file? ... Not at all. An "official" cancellation does precisely the same thing. It's impossibly hard to update an entry in the middle of the history file when the article is cancelled. -- If the Space Shuttle was the answer, | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology what was the question? | henry@zoo.toronto.edu utzoo!henry