icsu6000@caesar.cs.montana.edu (Jaye Mathisen) (12/15/89)
I have a question on the proper entries for the Distribution header. As I understand it, the Distribution header is to limit the distribution of an article to some logical or geographically related set of machines. So distributions of world go to every machine essentially, while distributions of mt restrict the article to a Montana distribution, etc. etc. Or you can use Distribution entries to coordinate article distribution around a business, or university in some coordinated fashion. The question: Are Distribution: entries of comp, rec, sci etc bogus? Isn't that implying 'near-world' distribution, as sys file entries dont as a general rule distinguish between hierarchies and distributions? Shouldn't these people be using world, na, usa, state, etc. or some other name, but NOT the hierarchy name? Are there news systems that distinguish between top-level hierarchy names and distributions? How do they handle a 'Distribution: comp' header? Seems to me they'd have to just put all the heirarchy names in the accepted distributions field, otherwise they'd lose articles. Or is this a problem of broken news-posting software? Or is my brain just out to lunch? -- +-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Jaye Mathisen,systems manager Internet: icsu6000@caesar.cs.montana.edu| | 410 Roberts Hall BITNET: icsu6000@mtsunix1.bitnet | | Dept. of Computer Science |
tale@cs.rpi.edu (David C Lawrence) (12/16/89)
[rec.motorcylists who don't really care about how come they're seeing Distribution: ba postings show up on their non-ba machines can just skip this. Follow-ups directed back to news.sysadmin.] In <2827@caesar.cs.montana.edu> icsu6000@caesar.cs.montana.edu (Jaye Mathisen): > I have a question on the proper entries for the Distribution header. Ok. First there should be a common definition for what the Distribution header means. This is provided by RFC 1036. RFC> 2.2.7. Distribution RFC> RFC> This line is used to alter the distribution scope of the message. RFC> It is a comma separated list similar to the "Newsgroups" line. User RFC> subscriptions are still controlled by "Newsgroups", but the message RFC> is sent to all systems subscribing to the newsgroups on the RFC> "Distribution" line in addition to the "Newsgroups" line. For the RFC> message to be transmitted, the receiving site must normally receive RFC> one of the specified newsgroups AND must receive one of the RFC> specified distributions. Thus, a message concerning a car for sale RFC> in New Jersey might have headers including: RFC> RFC> Newsgroups: rec.auto,misc.forsale RFC> Distribution: nj,ny RFC> RFC> so that it would only go to persons subscribing to rec.auto or misc. RFC> for sale within New Jersey or New York. The intent of this header RFC> is to restrict the distribution of a newsgroup further, not to RFC> increase it. A local newsgroup, such as nj.crazy-eddie, will RFC> probably not be propagated by hosts outside New Jersey that do not RFC> show such a newsgroup as valid. A follow-up message should default RFC> to the same "Distribution" line as the original message, but the RFC> user can change it to a more limited one, or escalate the RFC> distribution if it was originally restricted and a more widely RFC> distributed reply is appropriate. > As I understand it, the Distribution header is to limit the distribution > of an article to some logical or geographically related set of machines. Right. But note especially the words, "sent to all systems subscribing to the newsgroups on the "Distribution" line". > Are Distribution: entries of comp, rec, sci etc bogus? No. > Isn't that implying 'near-world' distribution, as sys file entries > dont as a general rule distinguish between hierarchies and > distributions? It depends on the sys file. C News allows you to distinguish between hierarchies and distributions in the sys file. B News does not, but this is sort of okay since they are supposed to be newsgroup hierarchies anyway. "Sort of" because C News allows me more flexibility of passing distributions without getting the hierarchies. Distributions of world, na, usa, inet and such are "pseudo-hierarchies" -- if a group world.aquaria was created and newgroup'ed on all of the USENET machines, it would have excellent distribution without having to change any sys files. > Shouldn't these people be using world, na, usa, state, etc. or some > other name, but NOT the hierarchy name? At this point it looks like they shouldn't even be using distributions at all. There is a great deal of user (and news admin) confusion about Distribution: and it's usage. > Are there news systems that distinguish between top-level hierarchy > names and distributions? How do they handle a 'Distribution: comp' > header? Seems to me they'd have to just put all the heirarchy names in > the accepted distributions field, otherwise they'd lose articles. As I said, C News does. I thought this was nifty at first because then I converted my sysfile so lines looked something like: foo:news,comp,sci,rec,misc,soc,talk,ny,capdist/world,na,usa,inet,ny,capdist:n:foo/togo Now they look more like this: foo:news,comp,sci,rec,misc,soc,talk,ny,capdist/all,!local:n:foo/togo Apparently a lot of sites are like this. Someone posted something Distribution: ba to rec.motorcycles and someone at Harvard followed up to it, noting the distribution. We do it because we don't want to limit things needlessly. For example, what of the user who posts with a Distribution: comp posting and the first sys file example? It doesn't go anywhere from my machine. According to RFC 1036, it should. Ok, so I can duplicate all of the hierarchies into the rhs of the / and then add pure distribuions like na and inet. It is a long, ugly sys line then and would still prevent some things from getting through that might not have needed the limitation. It would do so silently, too. (Good thing, because if it chattered about it to the news admin, we'd probably see even longer log files.) > Or is this a problem of broken news-posting software? It's a problem with a broken, confusing header line. Users don't know what to do with it and old software keeps running around telling people to limit their postings to the narrowest scope. Nowadays a lot of people don't want that. I have seen postings limited to distributions that I normally wouldn't get (like ba and tx) and wonder how come the poster limited it. There are frequent postings supposedly limited to usa, but there doesn't seem to be any need in many of these to limit them, either. When I say "need", I mean postings that very much have applicability in the intended distribution area. Again, using rec.motorcycles as an example, this would be things like the current Toys For Tots runs and a get-together that is being planned for some socializing. Yes, in one way we over here in NY don't want these postings ... we can't participate and listening to these people talk about pleasant warm-weather riding is somewhat annoying :-). _However_ it does also have the effect of encouraging us to do similar things in our area. As another example, why did you limit your original posting to na? I have seen many Canadians say, "Don't use usa! Use na!" and nearly as many Europeans say, "Don't use na! Use world!" Yes, for some topics this is very inappropriate; for most though it seems that the readers at the other end just want the news. Dave -- (setq mail '("tale@cs.rpi.edu" "tale@ai.mit.edu" "tale@rpitsmts.bitnet"))
brad@looking.on.ca (Brad Templeton) (12/17/89)
Too bad there's no easy answer to this. One would like distribution and newsgroup to be orthogonal, but you can't quite do this. For example, there are some groups that you don't want to set a maximum distribution on -- such as local political groups and forsales groups and "housing wanted" groups etc. Perhaps the ideal solution would be groups without distribution in them and a file indicating the maximum distribution for the group. Then we could get distribution out of the group name, and avoid many wars. -- Brad Templeton, ClariNet Communications Corp. -- Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473
icsu6000@caesar (Jaye Mathisen) (12/17/89)
In article <#5`G1_@rpi.edu> tale@cs.rpi.edu (David C Lawrence) writes: [bunch of stuff deleted that was a good explanation of the 'Distribution:' header] >As another example, why did you limit your original posting to na? I Because I knew that one of the following news wizards: yourself, rick@uunet.uu.net, henry@utzoo.uucp, geoff@utstat.uucp, brad@looking. on.ca, peter@ficc.uu.net and others :-) would answer, and based on what I think I know about where those people are, usa didn't catch brad,henry,or geoff, while world seemed like it would be wasting bandwidth, when I could get the answer with a smaller distribution. Anyway, thanks for answering, it explained it perfectly to me (now). -- +-----------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Jaye Mathisen,systems manager Internet: icsu6000@caesar.cs.montana.edu| | 410 Roberts Hall BITNET: icsu6000@mtsunix1.bitnet | | Dept. of Computer Science |