Text 3795, 111 rader
Skriven 2005-10-13 16:35:42 av Maurice Kinal (1:340/401.1)
   Kommentar till text 3783 av CHARLES ANGELICH (1:123/140)
Ärende: software for linspire
=============================
Hey CHARLES!

Oct 12 23:10 05, CHARLES ANGELICH wrote to MAURICE KINAL:

 CA> Not where I would expect them to be mainly. I have PhotoShop
 CA> but don't really like it. I've used PaintShop Pro most of the
 CA> time. 

I'll take your word on it.  I don't use any of them to be honest but have had
gimp onboard and taken it for a spin.  It worked with a wide variety of formats
and all the tools/filters/etc did a very good job.  Beats me what else the gimp
people could do with it to improve things.

 CA> Yes GIMP is definitely different from similar applications that
 CA> I have used under Windows. 

From what I've seen wrt Windows I'd say it is vastly superior or at least on
par with really expensive apps aimed at Windows, such as Corel Draw.  I've
never used them but from what I see of the end result I think gimp is better or
at least as good.

 CA> I certainly will let you know. :-) 

Sounds good.  Personally I am interested to see if their gut operation is all
that much different then what I tend to gravitate towards.  Offhand I'd think
it is simular except that theirs is probably vastly more expensive and better
hardware but I think the basic operation is simular.  I don't have their
budget.

 CA> QWK here. I used BlueWave until the Y2K issue sort of 'took it
 CA> out'. There is an addon that attempts to reset the dates but I
 CA> don't like it. After the time/effort I invested in rewriting
 CA> parts of ATP I do want to use it enough to justify the effort? 

Understood.  I don't have a QWK<->pkt filter.  I've never needed one so I have
never bothered.  I have the specs somewhere but decided long ago not to worry
about it.  If I thought it would make a difference (ie if there were local
users with QWK programs) I probably would have.  I think text is the way to go,
possibly a dynamic html cgi script for online display, possibly html for
offline messages.  That way they could use their browsers to do offline
messaging.

 CA> FIDO BBS software that _works_ is available - much of it is
 CA> free.

Yep.  So far I haven't seen one that does what I do here.  The closest would be
kermit and it could be scripted to handle everything.

 CA> dictators. I have no problem with moderating echos but
 CA> squashing ideas and/or opinions that are not shared by the
 CA> clique or the moderator is a bit too much. No one is paid to
 CA> post messages on FIDO so they eventually get sick of the
 CA> censoring of ideas/opinions and go elsewhere. THAT is what is
 CA> killing FIDO (again, IMO). 

Could very well be.  I don't let any of that stop me.  Sometimes I just ditch
whatever echoes.  I've been kicked out of this echo and yet here I am.

 CA> Many FIDO sysops argue that it never happened. I know because I
 CA> can track my messages. 

I've seen that happen.  It still does happen.

 CA> Not sure what you have in mind. There is no way for FTP to
 CA> initiate a scan of the message bases and compile a packet for
 CA> downloading unless the user uploaded a 'semaphore' file that
 CA> the BBS software was scanning for.

I have a plan.  It'll work but seeing as I won't use it I doubt it'll get used.
 I tend to use ftp as it was intended to be used as that is the best.  As far
as my ftp point goes, the hub takes care of packing my messages and isn't part
of the ftp scheme.  It knows what to do and does it.  ftp just transfers the
results.  It works really good.

 CA> On BBBS I had to intiate the
 CA> compilation then login using FTP for the transfers. Seemed
 CA> awkward and time consuming for such small packets as I get
 CA> lately (past few years). 

EXACTLY!!!  Why bog things down?

 CA> What I'm saying is whoever decided to subsume the 'zip' into
 CA> the names of gzip, bzip, etc. was being a bit dimwitted rather
 CA> than make up something new/different. I also don't think some
 CA> *nix users are consciously aware that their 'zip' is not
 CA> compatible with the PKzip of DOS/Windows. 

Who cares?  If you stick to one format, pkt in this case, then it doesn't
matter.  The only issue then is endianess but that is a minor problem these
days methinks if indeed it is an issue at all.  It certainly isn't an issue
between our respective PC's.

 CA> MulitMail, ATP, and probably other offline readers already
 CA> handle the QWK format.

Good for them.  Are they supplying a feed for them?

 CA> Wait a minute. YOU said that you wanted to do something about
 CA> FIDO access. I'm just making suggestions here. 

Right.  However we already decided that you don't wish to access here.  I
already decided before this particular exchange not to worry about any other
formats other then the one I have to worry about Fidoally speaking.  I am not
going to change that attitude for anyone who refuses to commit.  Like I said
before, they are only dead weight.  Right?

Life is good,
Maurice

--- Msged/LNX 6.1.2
 * Origin: Coffin Point - Ladysmith, BC Canada (1:340/401.1)