Kevan Cooke said 3 times:
hello folks
Actually he didn't - that was my fault, jumping around maniacally and throwing the switches too fast in the basement of the Sinister computer, like some mad evil doctor experimenting on you all. I suppose now is a suitable time to say: I'm going to have to move the archives and photos, and they're going to suffer as a result I'm afraid. I kept this from you a week ago as I didn't want to ruin your birthday (you're only 2) but here's what is likely to happen: 1. They'll be much slower to respond to new messages 2. They'll be in "reverse" order, newest messages at the top 3. The searching isn't going to be what it used to be: it will only be able to search for words, not phrases, etc. This is all very regrettable, to me more than any of you I can assure you as I spent oodles of time trying to make the archives as fast and flexible as they could be, and a lot of it's having to be chucked in the bin. So please don't give me a hard time over it, as I'm liable to give one of those little growls you hear bears with migraines give from the back of caves. I've been working "really quite" hard over the last week to do the best I can with a kind and noble body who will host the new archive for us, to the extent of patching their software for them to improve things a bit for you all. They provide a dead good service, for free, for the love of it, so we don't have to suffer any smarmy adverts, but they do it for thousands of lists so it has to stay manageable, thus the entirely honourable compromises. I haven't found a new home for the photos yet. Offers of oodles of WWW space are kind, but don't really solve the problem: the procedures to produce all this Sinister gumph required "shell access" to an external account that hosts the WWW pages, and I don't have that anywhere that I can host. Shell access because after a while of running this, you have to automate everything to even half keep up (and I only half keep up). If you don't know what shell access means, don't worry, but if you do happen to run an ISP, and can offer me Unix shell access to a WWW account with 200+MB of space and a hot net connection, and are happy to install system software on my behalf, and can guarantee I can keep this space indefinitely, and with complete independence, it might make me break out in a smile. If you could arrange for me to go on a cruise once a year that'd be nice as well. Yes, I know this is asking a lot so don't offer if you're at all unsure. :) Also if anyone knows of the best place on the web which can offer me 100's of MB of space, with no adverts, and most importantly where I can FTP into from *any* net connection, I'd be obliged. I've tried all the UK free ones and they're mean and stingy because they don't really care about Da Kidz and only allow ftp's from their own dialups. hosts.deny be damned. I do hate adverts so, it's just a foible of mine, because any service that's supported by advertising always end up to be crap. I could bore you all to tears ranting about how the Net should be for free, how it should be about people creating little worlds for themselves without trying to sell them anything through the back door, how it was and still can be, and why it all Actually Matters, but I'm going to stick a handkerchief in my mouth. If anyone has the slightest interest in such things, go and read the most eloquent rant from the heart on the subject I've ever read, from someone who really really cares, at: http://www.deja.com/=dnc/getdoc.xp?AN=339458840 My eyes actually did prickle a little bit. Enough. Mummy Honey xxx +----------------------------------------------------------------------+ +---+ Brought to you by the reborn Sinister mailing list +---+ To send to the list mail "sinister@majordomo.net". To unsubscribe send "unsubscribe sinister" or "unsubscribe sinister-digest" to "majordomo@majordomo.net". WWW: http://www.majordomo.net/sinister +-+ "legion of bedroom saddo devotees" "tech-heads and students" +-+ +-+ "the cardie wearing biscuit nibbling belle & sebastian list" +-+ +-+ "jelly-filled danishes" +-+ +----------------------------------------------------------------------+