From: G. James Berigan (usefor@war-of-the-worlds.org)
Date: Tue Nov 09 1999 - 11:49:53 CST
chl@clw.cs.man.ac.uk (Charles Lindsey) wrote:
>Bill Davidsen <davidsen@prodigy.com> writes:
>> Or we could just extend the current newgroup message which contains a
>> posting policy, like y or m, and allow the =new.group which INN users
>> will want in their active file anyway. No new control message, and the
>> meaning is human clear.
> But 'y' and 'm' are not part of the current standard (except in the
> deluded minds of whoever wrote the Collabra server).
>
> OTOH, the suggestion is interesting. Would the naive implementation (i.e.
> copy '=newgroup' into the active file) actually work without further ado?
> If so, it might be worth further investigation.
I don't think we should use newgroup to create alias entries. It doesn't
seem right to use newgroup in a way that doesn't create a new group.
Indeed, from what I understand, the action is the antithesis of newgroup:
it turns the existing group into a non-group alias. "newgroup old.group
=newgroup"?
If we have an alias command, it should be a different command, either as an
implied side-effect to mvgroup, or its own command[1], and not overloaded
onto another command just because it could work immediately.
[1] Does someone have an objection to using "alias" as a verb? I see it
only defined as a noun or adverb in my unabridged dictionary. (It's not
like rmgroup is in the dictionary either. :-)