Today I felt like I would go mad if I didn't program something, to change from
my usual  meeting/tape mounting/user support  activity (they call  it "systems
programming  consultant" :-)  ).  I  wrote the  SUPPORT  database  code I  had
mentioned some time ago. For now  it is installed on LISTSERV@LEPICS, although
it  will  probably  not  remain  there forever.  It's  simply  10  times  more
convenient to use a local 3192 than a slow SNA session to CEARN.
 
You access the database in R/O mode  using the standard LDBASE or LSVTALK (BTW
thanks Jose Maria for a very  niece piece of software), database name SUPPORT.
Just do  a SELECT  *, INDEX,  select one of  the entries,  PRINT and  you will
understand how it works much better than I could explain it in 10 lines.
 
To  append/add entries,  you  use  the LSVSUPP  EXEC  that  is available  from
[log in to unmask] Just type "LSVSUPP" and  answer the questions. Don't be afraid
to create  dummy test  entries, they  are easy to  discard (by  the postmaster
only). BE SURE TO PUT THE WORD "TEST" IN THE ABSTRACT THOUGH. You can't append
to an  entry which is not  "yours". This is  to avoid your participating  in a
conversation from which  you would not get any feedback.  I am considering the
implications of a SUBSCRIBE/SIGNOFF command, knowing that filelist pruners are
likely to subscribe to anything they can get their hand on, just for fun.
 
By the  way PLEASE WRITE MEANINGFUL  ABSTRACTS. I will discard  any entry that
shows up as  "LISTSERV problem" or "Question" if  I am in a normal  (bad :-) )
mood, if I am  in a particularly good mood I will rename  the abstract. I have
installed a  few of  the pending problem/suggestions  from my  UNREAD NOTEBOOK
into the database.
 
The  main advantage  of this  technique is  that you  get feedback  without my
having  to send  individual  replies  (assuming I  remember  who reported  the
problem) or  individual answers to your  question. You can also  find out what
the current pending problems are (SELECT  * IN SUPPORT WHERE STATUS='OPEN' AND
TYPE='PROB'). It also lets me keep track  of exactly what I have changed when,
and I  could write a  program later to  extract this information.  Finally, it
makes it  much easier  to distribute  questions between  several knowledgeable
persons. If I am to leave EARN in the future, I would probably still have some
kind of access  to the network, although  I wouldn't show up  very often. Thus
the people who do the maintenance on EARN could answer the "easy" problems and
change the STATUS of the tricky ones to, for example, "OPEN (LEV2)" :-), and I
would read  these and  append when  I have time.  It could  also automatically
forward the new appends to the regional coordinator, etc.
 
Of course,  I will  not force people  to address me  through a  database. This
would be stupid. But I hope that  the superior level of service they could get
through this new  system would incite them  to use it whenever  they want some
feedback. The more entries  we have, the more questions the  users can find an
answer to  by themselves, the more  'DUP id1 OF  id2' commands I can  issue to
point new questions back  to existing ones, and the more time  it saves me and
Ross, Jose Maria, Harold, etc.
 
  Eric