[ILUG] email as file transfer

[Ole Tange]

On Sun, 31 Jul 2005, Dave O Connor wrote:

> > Ahh, but now you assume that this will cause problems for the recipient.
> > And you assume the recipient would not have downloaded the file otherwise.
> > 
> > In this time and age where more and more have unmetered broadband 
> 
> This is a terrible argument. You're saying that it's okay to waste
> resources because we have the ability to?

I am saying that human time is a much more valuable ressource than
internet traffic. Optimize for human time - not machine time or internet
traffic. Human time is a scarce ressource - internet traffic is not.

> > Even mail to a modem user will often not be a problem if the modem user
> > expects the large email.
> 
> Yes, but the thing is that a lot fo the time they don't.  It's not an
> opt-in file transfer. Surely you can see how this is bad?

Only if you assume the modem recipient would not have downloaded the file
otherwise.

> > I am sure that I will not agree with those lucky people that have not had
> > to support novice users.
> 
> I've had to support novice users for several years. In fact, I've had
> to support extremely non-novice engineers that were adamant that we
> send out 12MB software patches as attachments to customers, for the
> simple reason that they were a muppet.

If your customers had mail servers and non-metered internet access then I
can see you could have saved human time by sending out these patches by
email - preferably at night. Then you would not waste any human time where
the human has to wait for the download by FTP.

> I never cease to be surprised at people's complacency at extreme
> resource wastage, and willingness to give in to people who are unwilling
> to do things properly.

I could not agree more. If just the developers could see how much valuable
human time they waste by not making email work properly as a file transfer
mechanism. It is cheaper to buy a larger internet connection than to have
people agree on a transfer mechanism and teach people that mechanism.


/Ole
-- 
Free software gives you the freedom to:
* F orward copies to anyone
* R un the program
* E xamine the source code
* E nhance the source code