[news.software.b] C News Bulletin #3 - important fix to history rebuild

henry@utzoo.UUCP (Henry Spencer) (11/22/87)

For a while during its development, C news used a 4-field history file.
We changed that to the current form, using a multi-part third field, to
avoid fouling up news readers that understood the file format.  We (well,
specifically, I) missed one place that needed to be fixed to match this
format change.  In the expire subsystem, the histdups program is used to
merge cross-postings during rebuilding of the history file.  It needs the
following fix:

12c12
< 		names = names " " $4
---
> 		names = names " " $3

Geoff spotted this one.  The effect of using histdups as distributed is
that when the history file is rebuilt, cross-posted articles get into it
under their first name only.  The result is a buildup of old articles, ones
that have been expired under their first name but are lingering on under
other names.  To clear up the problem, make the fix, rebuild your history
file one more time, and do an expire run.
-- 
Those who do not understand Unix are |  Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
condemned to reinvent it, poorly.    | {allegra,ihnp4,decvax,utai}!utzoo!henry