Date: Sat, 27 Apr 1996 14:16:27 +0100 From: "Gary Palmer" <gpalmer@FreeBSD.ORG> To: root@biblioteca.campus.unal.edu.co Cc: current@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: MH mail: part II Message-ID: <13810.830610987@palmer.demon.co.uk> In-Reply-To: Your message of "Fri, 26 Apr 1996 18:23:16 EDT." <Pine.A32.3.91.960426181114.25003A@biblioteca.campus.unal.edu.co>
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root@biblioteca.campus.unal.edu.co wrote in message ID <Pine.A32.3.91.960426181114.25003A@biblioteca.campus.unal.edu.co>: > I was out of the network for some time, and couldn`t reply against all > (correctly argumented) comentaries against MH. At a guess, you were proposing that MH should be in the base distribution? *SHUDDER* > The main reason I proposed it included is that it is a nonsense to > install xmh to find out it won`t run unless you add the mh package. That is not something we have much control over. XMH is part of the release from the X Consortium, and hence is in the XFree86 release. Why it is there, I have no idea. > It should be an OPTION, right from the start. Even more, it is documented > in the original BSD manuals. It is an option ... if you go to the package installation screen. Which ``original BSD manuals'' are you referring to? A quick glance through /usr/share/doc shows that MH is treated as CONTRIBUTED software, NOT part of the system, and I am fairly certain that a glance through a 4.4 Lite tape (or CDROM) will show that MH is NOT built or installed by default. How MH got into the USM section is anybodys guess. > There is a filosofical problem involved, what kind of system should > FreeBSD be? A system that runs by default all the traditional UNIX > (including MH), or a linuxed version of that old UNIX. (Don`t feel > offended, I like Linux, and it definitely is an example to be followed). MH is in no way (that I know of) ``traditional UNIX'' ... ``mail'' (found in /usr/bin on FreeBSD) is the ``traditional'' interface to the mail system, not the Rand MH system. As for ``runs by default'', MH is supplied PRE-COMPILED in the packages collection. What more could you ask for? If you are still saying that we should put MH into the main CVS tree and release it as part of FreeBSD proper, rather than a port/package, you're in for a disappointment. That will never happen. We are trying to avoid putting large, un-necessary chunks of source code into the system. Heck, if we put MH in, we'd have people clamouring for their favourite mailer to go in, and we'd shortly have Pine and Elm in there too. And then someone would need their favourite editor in there too, and suddenly Emacs would find its way in, and shortly you'd need to dedicate a 2Gb disk JUST for the bin distribution. Do you want that? And I doubt that any Linux distribution would install MH by default, but (at least for Slackware) it will probably offer you that option in the hundreds of questions it throws at you. FreeBSD pushes all TRULY ``optional'' software into the packages collection. You will not find MH included with any commercial Unix variants that I know of, and I don't see why (in this case) FreeBSD should be any different. I like MH (a lot), and it has been my mailer of choice for well over 3 years, but I am TOTALLY against seeing this (or any other *non-essential* third party software) becoming part of FreeBSD. > The answer, very probably is something in between, but the controversy > over the inclusion of MH must be left open. The answer already exists. It's the packages collection, which since 2.1R (and possibly 2.0.5R, I can't remember) you are offered the opportunity of browsing and installing stuff from AT INSTALL TIME. That is not controversial, and the discussion about inclusion of MH in the base system is at an end. It just won't happen. Gary -- Gary Palmer FreeBSD Core Team Member FreeBSD - Turning PC's into workstations. See http://www.FreeBSD.ORG/ for info.
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