kevinc@cs.athabascau.ca (Kevin Crocker) (01/16/91)
Archive-name: internet/disease/bitftp/1991-01-15 Original-posting-by: kevinc@cs.athabascau.ca (Kevin Crocker) Original-subject: Re: "But _I_ can't FTP..." Re: shared X systems available Reposted-by: emv@ox.com (Edward Vielmetti) xanthian@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG (Kent Paul Dolan) writes: >In comp.groupware article <151@intrbas.UUCP> >kenn@intrbas.uucp (Kenneth G. Goutal) writes: >One of the better kept secrets on the net appears to be the ability of >_anyone_ who can use email to retrieve stuff from FTP sites. >Princeton University Computer Center runs a pro bono email<->ftp server. >to bitftp@pucc.princeton.edu, and you will receive a document showing Kent, many of us do kn ow about the bitftp servers. We also know that several sites have sent very nasty notes about the use of these servers because from a UUCP site the e-mail has to come back through a UUCP site which is usually a gateway. The gateway at the University of Toronto (which is one of the major gateways for Canada) has sent out little hints that it can no longer support this type of usage of their equipment. they indicated that they were processing approximately 14,000 transfers a day and that a large protion of this is UUCP - Internet gatewayed traffic with the bulk of that as direct bitftp traffic. Since we have not managed to get our ftp system working to perfection in Canada (totally new hardware and software has been installed at most of the hubs) our ability to ftp directly is severely hampered (i.e. DEAD) and thus we tend to use the bitftp server a lot. I know that there are at least 5 of us at this small site and we try to coordinate what we ask for but we still seem to be getting about a megabyte a day. U of Toronto has politely but firmly told our systems admins that this has better ease off or they will yank the gateway. People should be careful to use other sites equipment and links without a clear understanding that UUCP traffic does cost real money and there is a correlation between traffic and cost. Internet traffic the costs tend to be more fixed in terms of equipment and the variable costs per byte are largely irrelevant until the level of activity gets high enough to warrant additional links and/or equipment. I have received messages from several gateways indicating that they would like me to ease off my requests. I test a lot of software. I have a local 210Mb disk which fills up just about every week and I turnover new software every week. UUCP was not designed to handle this kind of load. Internet is. Kevin -- Kevin "auric" Crocker Athabasca University UUCP: ...!{alberta,ncc}!atha!kevinc Inet: kevinc@cs.AthabascaU.CA