Cob: Lets get it back on topic!

[Shannon C. Dealy]

On Mon, 24 Feb 2003, jen walker wrote:

[snip]
> On the topic of restrictions, This is one for the web masters I guess. I had
> completely forgotten one of the rules...'no attachments' as I sent my house
> plans out for comments (a mere 100ish k) but was cut off at the pass. Fair
> enough, but what of those of us who don't have a web address to post an
> image too. Could we allow attachments under a certain size?
[snip]

There are a number of problems with attachments which is the reason I
don't allow them:

  1 - They are the primary means by which computer viruses, worms, etc.
      are transmitted, there was even at least one virus that could be
      transmitted in an image file (I don't remember which format).  The
      only sure way to prevent virus transmission through the list is to
      prevent the use of attachments (anti-virus software packages do not
      work nearly as well on a server that simply passes the message
      through as they do on a machine which receives and attempts to
      open the message).

  2 - Many users of this list have email services which severely limit the
      amount of space they have for storing received messages, a small
      image file attached to a message can easily consume as much space as
      ten to twenty typical messages.  Just a few messages with images in
      them could overflow their mailbox, resulting in their missing all
      future messages (and me getting back all messages to them from the
      coblist until their mailbox is emptied, and I already get far to
      many of these).  On a couple of occasions messages with attached
      pictures have been sent to the coblist (though I did not allow
      them to pass through) that were well over a megabyte in size
      (roughly equivalent to 200-400 messages).

  3 - Most internet users still connect using modems, and in many
      countries the cost of using the internet is a function of connect
      time and/or amount of data transferred, and is much more expensive
      than many people realize.  This makes the time and cost of receiving
      these large messages relatively very high for some people.

There is at least a partial solution to some of these problems which I
have been looking into in preparation for changing the list to a different
software package, but I'm not sure when the change will take place
(reeeaaaal soooooon now :-) or if the new software will support these
solutions.

Shannon C. Dealy      |               DeaTech Research Inc.
dealy at deatech.com     |          - Custom Software Development -
                      |    Embedded Systems, Real-time, Device Drivers
Phone: (800) 467-5820 | Networking, Scientific & Engineering Applications
   or: (541) 451-5177 |                  www.deatech.com