Re: the nntp effort on in james server !!!!

[Harmeet Bedi <ha...@kodemuse.com>]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Santoshi, Vishal" <Vi...@gallup.com>


>      i just recently started working on the nntp aspect of James .
>  And would like to be a part of the effort .

Happy to hear that. As a start, I would recommend you use it for some time
and familarize yourself with the code. Getting familar with Avalon will also
help. Are you particularly interested in NNTP or in other James protocols
like POP3/SMTP ?

>  And towards tha goal would be highly thankfull if u could share with me
>  the vison and planning that u are putting in .

I think this is a good question, what do you all think the nntp vision
should be ?

Some things that I thought that would be nice are
- Better access control mechanism. At present a well behaved client will not
post, but say if post is not allowed for a user than even a custom nntp
client should not be able to post.
- Making the backend more flexible. Maybe map to SMPT/POP3 backend store on
the other hand I feel NNTP is nicely decoupled.
- Having Mailet/Matcher/LinearProcessor facility.
- NNTP sycnhronization with master-slave nntp servers. I was thinking of
doing this by writing a Avalon Block.

> Further i need a robust
> application b'fore long
>  and therefore would love to be a pusher if that's what u would call me.

If you find it is not robust, tell me why. I think it is robust and fast,
although I could be wrong. Would love to know more.

A good strategy would be heads up on why you think NNTP is not robust, or
fast etc and a follow up with suggested fixes. :-)

Harmeet

PS. I contributed to NNTP significantly, but james-dev is the owner. I am
happy to recieve direct email(esp. now that I have spam blockers), but it is
better to send James related email to the james-dev list - thanks.


----- Original Message -----
From: "Santoshi, Vishal" <Vi...@gallup.com>
To: <ha...@kodemuse.com>
Sent: Monday, April 01, 2002 2:31 PM
Subject: the nntp effort on in james server !!!!


> hi ,
>      i just recently started working on the nntp aspect of James .
>  And would like to be a part of the effort .
>  And towards tha goal would be highly thankfull if u could share with me
>  the vison and planning that u are putting in .Further i need a robust
> application b'fore long
>  and therefore would love to be a pusher if that's what u would call me.
>
> vishal santoshi ,
> S/W developer ,
> GALLUP ORGANIZATION.
>
>


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UserRepository [ was the nntp effort on in james server !!!! ]

[Paul Hammant <ha...@apache.org>]

Harmeet, folks,

>- How stable is the POP-SMTP backend ? There have been a few emails about
>this. When I looked at the Avalon File Repository, I was a bit nervous. I
>think it is based on serialization, and that approach has some problems,
>
The Avalon repository is file based and uses serialization.  There are 
problems with that strategy.

Choices:

Avalon's FtpServer (Rana CC'd in for this) has a user repsository and 
the overlap between FTP, POP3 & NNTP user requirements are massive.  You 
should all bang heads and make an uberUserRepository that will be useful 
for all of those types of needs, and possibly a few forthcoming 
(telnet/SSH into a Phoenix VM).

At a layer lower (the actual mechanics of storage), there is an up and 
coming project in commons called simple store.  (Gerhard and Juozas CC'd 
in for this) It is beanlike and has multiple implementations.  It has 
been used before in Phoenix VM with Enterprise Object Broker (example3) 
, but not as a block or wrapped in a block...

Lastly, maybe also see if Brian Burton's ex commercial NNTP server 
http://www.burton-computer.com/clnews.html can provide inspiration. 
 Maybe even have another attempt at persuading him to port or donate (to 
Avalon and James respectively).

Regards,

- Paul H


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RE: the nntp effort on in james server !!!!

[Danny Angus <da...@thought.co.uk>]

fair point, and just the kind of task I'm best at...

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Serge Knystautas [mailto:sergek@lokitech.com]
> Sent: 04 April 2002 22:48
> To: James Developers List
> Subject: Re: the nntp effort on in james server !!!!
>
>
> Well, I'd be happy with ANY kind of feedback to users when they start
> James, such as "you haven't configured DNS" or "you have a bad DB
> connection defined", or stuff like that.  Half our emails are due to
> Avalon sticking error messages in weird places in obscure log files.
> I'm just pointing out we have to start walking before we run. ;)
> --
> Serge Knystautas
> Loki Technologies - Unstoppable Websites
> http://www.lokitech.com/
>
> Danny Angus wrote:
> > ... and to add some more general thoughts I'm having why not
> distribute an
> > installer which will fetch selected components from the web, like M$ web
> > installation?
> >
> >
> >>-----Original Message-----
> >>From: Serge Knystautas [mailto:sergek@lokitech.com]
> >>Sent: 04 April 2002 18:23
> >>To: James Developers List
> >>Subject: Re: the nntp effort on in james server !!!!
> >>
> >>
> >>Danny Angus wrote:
> >>
> >>>Alternatively.. we should produce a James container, and seperately
> >>>distributable blocks for each protocol..
> >>
> >>+1 on this.  It seems like we are not taking advantage of some of
> >>Avalon's features by just making a single bar/app do everything.
> >>
> >>Serge Knystautas
> >>Loki Technologies - Unstoppable Websites
> >>http://www.lokitech.com/
> >>
> >>
> >>--
> >>To unsubscribe, e-mail:
> >><ma...@jakarta.apache.org>
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> >><ma...@jakarta.apache.org>
>
>
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Re: the nntp effort on in james server !!!!

[Serge Knystautas <se...@lokitech.com>]

Well, I'd be happy with ANY kind of feedback to users when they start 
James, such as "you haven't configured DNS" or "you have a bad DB 
connection defined", or stuff like that.  Half our emails are due to 
Avalon sticking error messages in weird places in obscure log files. 
I'm just pointing out we have to start walking before we run. ;)
-- 
Serge Knystautas
Loki Technologies - Unstoppable Websites
http://www.lokitech.com/

Danny Angus wrote:
> ... and to add some more general thoughts I'm having why not distribute an
> installer which will fetch selected components from the web, like M$ web
> installation?
> 
> 
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: Serge Knystautas [mailto:sergek@lokitech.com]
>>Sent: 04 April 2002 18:23
>>To: James Developers List
>>Subject: Re: the nntp effort on in james server !!!!
>>
>>
>>Danny Angus wrote:
>>
>>>Alternatively.. we should produce a James container, and seperately
>>>distributable blocks for each protocol..
>>
>>+1 on this.  It seems like we are not taking advantage of some of
>>Avalon's features by just making a single bar/app do everything.
>>
>>Serge Knystautas
>>Loki Technologies - Unstoppable Websites
>>http://www.lokitech.com/
>>
>>
>>--
>>To unsubscribe, e-mail:
>><ma...@jakarta.apache.org>
>>For additional commands, e-mail:
>><ma...@jakarta.apache.org>


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RE: the nntp effort on in james server !!!!

[Danny Angus <da...@thought.co.uk>]

... and to add some more general thoughts I'm having why not distribute an
installer which will fetch selected components from the web, like M$ web
installation?

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Serge Knystautas [mailto:sergek@lokitech.com]
> Sent: 04 April 2002 18:23
> To: James Developers List
> Subject: Re: the nntp effort on in james server !!!!
>
>
> Danny Angus wrote:
> > Alternatively.. we should produce a James container, and seperately
> > distributable blocks for each protocol..
>
> +1 on this.  It seems like we are not taking advantage of some of
> Avalon's features by just making a single bar/app do everything.
>
> Serge Knystautas
> Loki Technologies - Unstoppable Websites
> http://www.lokitech.com/
>
>
> --
> To unsubscribe, e-mail:
> <ma...@jakarta.apache.org>
> For additional commands, e-mail:
> <ma...@jakarta.apache.org>
>


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Re: the nntp effort on in james server !!!!

[Serge Knystautas <se...@lokitech.com>]

Danny Angus wrote:
> Alternatively.. we should produce a James container, and seperately
> distributable blocks for each protocol..

+1 on this.  It seems like we are not taking advantage of some of 
Avalon's features by just making a single bar/app do everything.

Serge Knystautas
Loki Technologies - Unstoppable Websites
http://www.lokitech.com/


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RE: the nntp effort on in james server !!!!

[Danny Angus <da...@thought.co.uk>]

> - I still don't know what and if there is a gain in
> functionality. I haven't
> heard anyone want a db Backend for newsgroup mail. Why build, if
> there is no
> known advantage ? On the other hand if someone has a real world need that
> would be motivation.

> - The NNTP repository is a lot simpler. Minimal coupling.
>
> What do you think ?

Frankly thats a good enough argument for defering it.

>
> Here is a proposal for your vote:
> Have a separate distribution for NNTP Server.

-1 with the following comment.. I agree with your reasoning and I will
change my vote to +1 if we can, instead, provide a single distribution of
James, and an alternative set of configurations which will allow it to run
as NNTP only. (perhaps with a command line installer with options to install
NNTP, MAIL or BOTH)

I would not like to see James fragment into several seperate products, I'd
be happier if we focused this effort on making it simple to enable and
disable blocks.

Alternatively.. we should produce a James container, and seperately
distributable blocks for each protocol..

> All other parts will be
> disabled. Advantages are:
> - Provides a minimum configuration changes needed package for users that
> only need NNTP.
> - This help the James brand and increase the number of users.
> - I personally feel that POP3-SMTP and NNTP are of interest to
> (mostly)separate groups of users. I also feel that the users would want to
> try POP3-SMTP and NNTP Server at different times, and are less lilkely to
> try them together.  One precedent is INN Server. It includes NNTP
> Server but
> not POP-SMTP Servers. James-NNTP could be targeted as an
> alternative to INN.
>
> Harmeet
>
>
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Re: the nntp effort on in james server !!!!

[Harmeet Bedi <ha...@kodemuse.com>]

From: "Harmeet Bedi" <ha...@kodemuse.com>
> > - Making the backend more flexible. Maybe map to SMPT/POP3
> > backend store on
> > the other hand I feel NNTP is nicely decoupled.
>


From: "Danny Angus" <da...@thought.co.uk>
> I think NNTP should use the same avalon framework as POP & SMTP (although
> I'm not volunteering to do this, so I guess my vote isn't really fair..)
> this would mean that it could use file or DB, and share configuration
> information with other blocks.
>


I think it is a given that having the same mechanism for NNTP is a clean and
good thing to do, but here are some advantages for keeping the NNTP
repository separate.
- Faster than the repository for POP & SMTP.
- Streamed. Entire message content is never in memory.
- It is easier to separte NNTP from the other parts. Folks may want to use
NNTP Server but may want to use another mail servers. Such a user would not
need to worry about non-nntp configuration.
- I still don't know what and if there is a gain in functionality. I haven't
heard anyone want a db Backend for newsgroup mail. Why build, if there is no
known advantage ? On the other hand if someone has a real world need that
would be motivation.
- How stable is the POP-SMTP backend ? There have been a few emails about
this. When I looked at the Avalon File Repository, I was a bit nervous. I
think it is based on serialization, and that approach has some problems,
like say schema evolution, speed etc. If SMTP-POP3 repository is not
completly safe, maybe we should continue with NNTP repository for some time
and then revisit.
- The NNTP repository is a lot simpler. Minimal coupling.

What do you think ?

Here is a proposal for your vote:
Have a separate distribution for NNTP Server. All other parts will be
disabled. Advantages are:
- Provides a minimum configuration changes needed package for users that
only need NNTP.
- This help the James brand and increase the number of users.
- I personally feel that POP3-SMTP and NNTP are of interest to
(mostly)separate groups of users. I also feel that the users would want to
try POP3-SMTP and NNTP Server at different times, and are less lilkely to
try them together.  One precedent is INN Server. It includes NNTP Server but
not POP-SMTP Servers. James-NNTP could be targeted as an alternative to INN.

Harmeet


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RE: the nntp effort on in james server !!!!

[Danny Angus <da...@thought.co.uk>]

> I think this is a good question, what do you all think the nntp vision
> should be ?

> - Making the backend more flexible. Maybe map to SMPT/POP3
> backend store on
> the other hand I feel NNTP is nicely decoupled.

I think NNTP should use the same avalon framework as POP & SMTP (although
I'm not volunteering to do this, so I guess my vote isn't really fair..)
this would mean that it could use file or DB, and share configuration
information with other blocks.

> - Having Mailet/Matcher/LinearProcessor facility.

+1 this would allow people to write NNTP "gateways" to mail or other
protocols.

> - NNTP sycnhronization with master-slave nntp servers. I was thinking of
> doing this by writing a Avalon Block.

+1

d.


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