Re: Do we still do Incoming* files?

[Laura Conrad <lconrad@world.std.com>]

>>>>> "Gunnar" == Gunnar Evermann <ge204@eng.cam.ac.uk> writes:

    Gunnar> why do you use CVS then? stick with the tarballs or use
    Gunnar> the CVS tags to checkout snapshots/releases, i.e. 5.8.3
    Gunnar> atm.

I'm not complaining about having hit the problem -- it made me feel
useful to be the first to report something like that.  

But I had thought I knew where the mail would be if gnus wasn't
finding it.  

I'm proposing a change in the documentation, so that other people may
be less confused than I was.

Right now, the instructions for using cvs say:

    gnus.org> The proper incantation for checking out the Gnus sources
    gnus.org> the first time is this:  

    gnus.org> ...    

    gnus.org> (You type the bold parts.) 

    gnus.org> You can then rename the resulting gnus directory to
    gnus.org> whatever you want -- like, for instance, pgnus.  

    gnus.org> After doing this, to get a fresh Gnus, all you have to
    gnus.org> do is say:  

    gnus.org> ...
    

    gnus.org> Please note that what you're getting is probably not even a
    gnus.org> bleeding-edge Gnus, but a severly hemorrhaging one. 

I'm proposing that we add something like:

    proposal> It's also a copy of what will be the released version,
    proposal> when it gets that far.  So the version number is gnus
    proposal> x.x.x, not <x>gnus-0.xx, and in order to report a
    proposal> problem, you need to specify the time you downloaded the
    proposal> cvs snapshot.  

    proposal> Also, an important protection for users of <x>gnusae is
    proposal> not in effect in the cvs repository.  That is, the
    proposal> variable mail-source-delete-incoming is set to t in the
    proposal> released versions, and in the CVS repository.  When an
    proposal> <x>gnus tarball is rolled, the default for this variable
    proposal> is changed to 'nil', so that a development version with
    proposal> a serious bug is less likely to lose people's mail.  So
    proposal> you probably want to think about the appropriate setting
    proposal> for this variable yourself.

This might reduce the frequency of the Frequently Asked Question "What 
are all these 'Incoming*' files in my ~/Mail directory", too.

If there are other differences between cvs gnus and the pgnus, or
future ognus, tarballs, that I don't know about yet, maybe someone
would like to write those up.  

-- 
Laura (mailto:lconrad@world.std.com , http://www.world.std.com/~lconrad/ )
(617) 661-8097	fax: (801) 365-6574 
233 Broadway, Cambridge, MA 02139