CURRENT_MEETING_REPORT_ Reported by David Lippke/UTEXAS LISTSERV BOF Minutes The LISTSERV BOF at the IETF meeting in St Louis went well. It was attended by a positive subset of the Internet Mail Extensions Working Group plus a number of people involved with the applications area of the IETF. In addition, Bruce Crabill, Larry Snodgrass, and John Wobus attended, therefore the full BITNET contingent was probably represented. However, it was clear that a number of the internetists had made an effort to educate themselves on LISTSERV and at least one had experience with maintaining a LISTSERV list. David Lippke worked through about 35 foils which roughly followed the outline below: 1. BITNET background (size, growth, topology, traffic statistics). 2. LISTSERV background (history, present status, various statistics). 3. Definition of the original problem. 4. Overview of the main concepts, features, and facilities (13 points). 5. Two foils worth of list peering and its application. 6. Five foils on ``distribute''. 7. A bit on relayed file distribution. 8. Two foils on loop detection/suppression. 9. Six foils as a detailed look at list configuration. 10. A bit on NAD capabilities. 11. A slow three foils on user commands and options. 12. A bit on list archival and file storage (it was stressed several times throughout that standard list archival was a big deal). 13. Two foils on the database facility. 14. Then about 3 foils giving David's opinion of what's needed in the way of LISTSERV capabilities on the internet. The whole session was rather interactive with at least a question or two asked on each foil and the responses to the questions occasionally turning into short discussions. It was a good crowd to talk to since everyone had already done some (or maybe alot) of thinking about related issues. Consequently, there wasn't much left in regard to LISTSERV itself when David reached the end of his foils. 1 Phill Gross took over the discussion at that point and concluded with the group that a ``LISTSERV'' Working Group should be formed since there are clearly things which need to be done and there's also enough interest in the project to make things happen. One person said that they would like to see a basic set of user operations (upon lists) defined first so that they could proceed with a simple implementation of those while a compatible superset was developed over time. There seemed to be general agreement with this notion. Phill then suggested that a list be formed to proceed with the Working Group discussion before the July IETF. Chris Myers of Washington University volunteered listdev@wugate.wustl.edu and this was accepted. To subscribe send e-mail to listserv@wugate.wustl.edu with a body part of ``add listdev''. To unsubscribe send e-mail to listserv@wugate.wustl.edu with a body part of ``delete listdev''. To send a message to the list send e-mail to listdev@wugate.wustl.edu. The initial membership will be taken from the attendance roster with the addition of Eric. Anyone who is interested in participating in the Working Group is welcome to join the list A PostScript copy of the foils is available upon request from David Lippke. Attendees Bruce Crabill bruce@umdd.umd.edu David Crocker dcrocker@pa.dec.c Ralph Droms droms@bucknell.edu Johnny Eriksson bygg@sunet.se Demi Getschko "DEMI@FPSP.HEPNET" Phillip Gross pgross@nri.reston.va.us Russ Hobby rdhobby@ucdavis.edu Neil Katin katin@eng.sun.com Shelly Knueven shelly@wugate.wustl.edu Vincent Lau vlau@sun.com Eliot Lear lear@net.bio.net David Lippke lippke@utdallas.edu Chris Myers chris@wugate.wustl.edu Lawrence Snodgrass snodgras@educom.edu Bernhard Stockman bygg@sunet.se Gregory Vaudreuil gvaudre@nri.reston.va.us John Wobus jmwobus@suvm.acs.syr.edu 2