finger url, copyright caches (again)

Nick Galbreath (nickg@math.bu.edu)
Mon, 22 Aug 1994 21:52:44 +0200

Two things:

Is the finger URL really even needed, except for ease of use? It
seems to me a 10 line perl CGI script would take care of it with a
calling of . <a href = "http:/cgi-bin/finger?[name@university.edu]">

Copyrights and Caches
------------------------------

I would hold off getting all steamed up about the problem of
copyrights and caches simply becasue legally it untested water. I
would bet that any file that is so time sensitive, that it will print
a disclaimer absolving the creator from any problmes it might cause
and the time of creation. It would then be up to the user, either to
start a new WWW browsing session or hit the "reload" button if using
Mosaic if they felt the data might be "old".

As I recall, Mosaic allows one to turn off caching (or set the buffer so
small that it is "off").

Until more sophiscated schemes of user and document authentication,
etc etc etc come out. I don't really think it is an issue.

-grumpy-old-nickg