Subject: Re: msg-id

From: John Stanley <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 08:41:21 -0800 (PST)

Seth Breidbart <sethb@xxxxxxxxx>:

> True; but so what? 

So it is an error to talk about "once per thousand years" as if it
meant it could not happen tomorrow and the next day.

> The _spec_ says "MUST be unique". 

That's right. So that's why the error I mentioned above makes a "once
per thousand years" system inappropriate. Do you disagree?

>If a particular
>implementation only guarantees uniqueness with a probability greater
>than the one that my computer won't melt in between my typing the
>message and hitting "send", 

Computers breaking down is much more probable than "once per thousand 
years". If you work in the business you will see it happen much more often
than that.

>I consider that
>level of lossage acceptable.  If you don't, feel free not to use that
>implementation.

When did I get to choose what implementation of message id is used in
the news server installed at the ISP I use, and when did I get to choose 
the implementation used on your server?

<thorfinn@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>:

>It's a lot less of a worry than the people who don't use any kind of
>scheme at all for the LHS.

A novel excuse for doing it wrong: it's less wrong than people who do it
wronger.

---

From: Seth Breidbart <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 11:51:29 -0500 (EST)

> meant it could not happen tomorrow and the next day.

To whom are you attributing that error?

> per thousand years" system inappropriate. Do you disagree?

Yes.  A hardware flaw could cause collisions in a "never" scheme; is
that scheme therefore inappropriate if run on hardware?

> years". If you work in the business you will see it happen much more often

Computer breakdown during the 3 seconds between finishing editing the
proto-article and hitting "send" is less common than breakdown in
general.

>>I consider that level of lossage acceptable.  If you don't, feel
>>free not to use that implementation.
>
> the news server installed at the ISP I use,

If it's that important to you, choose your ISP based on it or run your
own news server as a peer.  (Can't your user agent generate the
Message-Id anyway?)

> and when did I get to choose 

You don't.  If I generate duplicates, then my system won't play nice
with others, and some of my articles will disappear.  You don't have
to consider that a problem.

Seth