This is primarally about the archive index #s, the numbers attached to
each item in a list's arcives, and their absence in current GETPOST
output, but first, about the other changes to GETPOST.

LSOFT decided to change the default of GETPOST command output from
text/plain to multipart/mixed, for the benefit of those lists which allow
attachments of various format.  It did provide for attaching NOMIME to a
GETPOST command, either before or after the numbers, works either way, for
those who didn't want a string of attachments (like the many subscribers to
many lists which do not permit attachments of any description), but it
seems to have forgotten that when an INDEX subscriber sends his edited
INDEX to listname-search-request that that constitutes a GETPOST and made
no provision for the INDEX subscribers to obtain NOMIME output.  This is a
flaw which needs to be corrected.

Pesonally, I think LSOFT should have left the default output of GETPOST as
it was, and added MIME as an option to the command, not forgetting to do
the same for the INDEX subscribers sending their edited INDEXes to
listname-search-request.  One possibility which comes to mind is that if
the list has Attachments= No in the list header, then the GETPOST defualt
is NOMIME, but if the list allows attachments of any description, the
GETPOST default is MIME.

Just an idea, but *something* needs to be done to allow INDEX subscribers
to have NOMIME output when they send their edited INDEXes to
listname-search-request.

Now, for my additional gripe.

With the new GETPOST the individual items are not visibly identified by
their archive index #s, their posting #s.  In the past, when one did a
GETPOST, the archive index # of each item would be clearly stated at the
begining of each item; this is no longer the case, regardless of whether
one gets MIME or NOMIME output.  If one does a search, then selects, say 15
items for the GETPOST, some of them by the same person on the same topic,
those index #s are very useful to tell a subscriber "The item you want is
# whatever."  Without the numbers, one must carefully count the items
received in the output, then try to correlate them with the numbers
ordered.  A pain for only one, a "forget it" if there are several "right"
ones interspersed through 15 - 30 items, none of which are marked with the
archive item numbers.  They used to be marked like this:
>>> Posting number 7396, dated ...
and that marking was very handy in more ways than one.

Please restore the archive item #s, the posting #s, to GETPOST output.

Douglas Winship
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P.S. I did an item for my lists about this, which I don't include, but will
send it to the list, if anyone is interested. d.w.