Reclaiming this mailing list and project

[Rick Moen]

Jeff Bailey created the predecessor to this mailing list for the Hydrant 
PINE-replacement project (using SmartList) on 7 Jan 2000.  (To my
knowledge, that incarnation's archive is lost.)  Some time later that
year, the list was migrated to GNU Mailman, its current software.

Jeff's idea was to build a PINE-like MUA using GNU Mailutils's
libmailbox as an engine, with a collection of libraries on top of that 
in C++.  The Hydrant project is hosted on
Savannah: http://savannah.gnu.org/projects/hydrant .  The Savannah project
pages do not cross-link to this mailing list.  (Their mailing list link
yields "No Lists found for hydrant".)

Source code thus far (in C, not C++, though there are some hooks for C++
constructs), available under GNU GPL v.2 or later, can be retrieved from
the project's CVS repository.

There've been a very modest number of non-spam posts to this list -- 13
of them in six years -- and then a deluge of spam that accelerated
dramatically starting in Sept. 2005.  There are currently 11 subscribers.  

I wrote to Jeff recently and got his permission to fix the spam problem, 
along with repairing other aspects of mailing list setup.  You'll notice
that the deluge has stopped.  (Yay!)  With help from FSF sysadmins, we
expect to soon de-spam the back-postings archive, as well.

With Jeff's indulgence, I've established new mailing list policies as
follows:

o  Only subscribed addresses may post.  Membership remains open. 
   The list remains unmoderated.
o  The membership roster will be available to all list members.
o  The Web-accessible back-postings archive will cease to 
   obscure posting addresses.  Do not post from any address you
   wish to remain unknown to the public.


Josh I. Miller started a similar project in March 2004, attempting to
clone Pine in Perl.  Initially called "nmail", using several CPAN
modules and issued under GNU LGPL v.2.1, it was later renamed to "oserp"
(OpenSource Emailer Replaces Pine).  That project is hosted at BerliOS,
at http://developer.berlios.de/projects/oserp/ , and at this writing is
said to be pre-alpha.

-- 
Cheers,             
Rick Moen                 Support your local medical examiner:  Die strangely.
address@hidden