Subj : What I Don't Like About Synchronet
To   : Joe Bruchis
From : Mvan Le
Date : Sun Apr 29 2007 03:11 am

 JB> I was a Max SysOp many moons ago, and loved the 
 JB> freedom to customize.
 JB> I have run Synchronet Win/32 and it's extremely 
 JB> configurable, plus has an STMP email server, news 
 JB> server, telnet server and web interface.... and it all 
 JB> costs -0-.  Plus the support is free and always 
 JB> available in the many Sync related echoes. The author, 
 JB> Rob Swindell, will respond to questions in 24 hrs, but 
 JB> of course, requires everyone to consult the docs and 
 JB> try before asking.

Rob Swindell's alright. I get the feeling he doesn't like me very much. :)

As of v3.14, there're a couple of things I don't like about Synchronet. 

Mainly its message reading functionality. Thus far this is my critique, 

* When quoting replies lines are prefixed with ">" which eventually truncates 
the quoted line, which means each reply truncates more of the original message 
text.  

* It lacks some of the user-customisable message searching functions that 
Maximus has eg. Browse Msg -> All areas -> List messages (instead of Read 
messages) etc.  

* As of v3.14 it only has 2 options when scanning messages: 1) list message 
titles, or 2) display messages -- which effectively reads the message and 
updates the message pointer, and I might prefer pointers unmodified since I can 
refer to those messages later ie. after a scan.  

* When listing message titles it clutters the screen with all the subgroups.

* When listing message titles it also lists -OLD- / read messages which 
clutters the screen even more.

* Where's the 'read original' message option ? I only saw some sorting by 
thread / author options ...

* Currently a plugin is required for new-message-received notifications. And 
these notifications are displayed and then deleted during the logon process so 
the user can't review those new message notifications later eg. subsequent 
logons, which is quite inconvenient.  

* I don't like the board/sub-board (RA-style group/subgroup) file/message area 
categorising method. Traversing the Maximus Usenet style divisions are a more 
logical/relational/intuitive breakdown of message groups & areas. (imo). And  
the heirarchies can be embedded deep.

Interestingly the author said he had never encountered such feature requests, 
which bewildered me, and led me to believe that the majority of Synchronet 
users are more caught up in its internet 'spectacularisms' than messaging. 

But anyway, due to a revival of interest from the author on his dwindled 
project; it took off. What makes Synchronet worthwhile, apart from its internet 
capabilities and multiplatform support, is the active and enthusiastic 
development community; which is how new features and bug fixes get rapidly 
tested and implemented.  

Anything can be made "highly customisable" if you have source code. 

But Scott Dudley disappared off the face of the earth. I don't blame him.
So now there's only a half-arsed intermittently commited ragtag user group 
left. 

Hypothetically if I contracted dozens of dedicated Chinese/Indian/Russian 
students AUD$5k pa to develop Maximus it would easily be better than 
Synchronet. Money is a powerful catalyst. 

Oh well. Maybe one day :)

"I'm a die-hard Maximus fan and I ain't switch'n, ever." -- received quite a 
lot of flagrant replies in the (imo reproachable (at the time)) Synchronet 
Discussion echo in contrast to the humble mild mannered MUFFIN echo seemingly 
full of UN embassadors like Ryan de Laplante ...

--- Maximus/2 3.01
 * Origin: Top Hat 2 BBS (1:343/41)

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