From: Bruce Campbell <bruce(_dot_)campbell(_at_)ripe(_dot_)net>
To: Vernon Schryver <vjs(_at_)calcite(_dot_)rhyolite(_dot_)com>
cc: ietf(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org
Why are your, Eric Brunner-Williams's, Robert Elz's, and my messages
present in the archive for the IETF list at
http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/ietf/index.html
while Mr. Kehres's are absent?
A large mailing list (such as ietf(_at_)ietf(_dot_)org) is not a FIFO.
Delivery of
one message may get blocked while a later message gets delivered (and in
this instance to the web archive) first.
Anyone who has been around for more than a few months is quite familiar
with such hassles.
In this instance, given the extremely short time span between the messages
(please note carefully the GMT offset of the messages in question), it
should not be perceived as a problem. If you were referring to
non-arrival of messages after a significant amount of time (a day or more,
again carefully noting the GMT offsets), then that is a problem.
Those whose addresses are like mine and are near the end of the alphabet
are accustomed to receiving copies of messages from IETF and other
reflectors after things have settled for everyone else.
I did not intend to ask about the order of messages. If you check
headers of the messages I asked about, you'll see that most of a day
did in fact elapse between the time you might infer that that I and
my filters received the copies (plural) of the messages (also plural)
and my question. You can see that my responses to Mr. Kehres's messages
are in early part of the "Mar 17 2002" list while his are in the
"Mar 18 2002" list. You can also see that my question and Harald's
answer appeared in the archive before Mr. Kehres's messages.
I guess I was confused by the multiple copies I saw of Mr. Kehres's
messages. I would have sworn that one copy of each of his message
came via the reflector for this list. Evidently I was wrong, and the
copies of his messages in this list were delayed for moderation.
I could not justify writing this response to the IETF list except:
1. Bruce Campbell's confusion as well as my own about what happened
in this case shows that the moderation is not entirely transparent.
I don't think that's objectionable, but others might.
2. to acknowledge the apparent accuracy of Harald Tveit Alvestrand's
response, "I suspect that the moderator is taking the weekend off."
3. to offer this as an example of what some people see as terrible
side effects to such moderation or filtering. I think it's ok as
long as I know about it and so don't get confused by it.
4. if I were in charge, I'd be using the DCC and arranging the count
filtering to reject all messages with target counts >1. This
would have a side effect of ending much cross-posting as well as
many "courtesy copies." I think that would be good, but those
who enjoy many copies of messages (e.g. CFPs) might disagree.
5. I try hard to trim individual addresses from my responses precisely
to avoid such confusion. That does slow down discussions, but I think
the otherwise common confusion is worse than the slowness.
Vernon Schryver vjs(_at_)rhyolite(_dot_)com