[Assp-devel] old ClamAV databases and other antiques

Lee Howard

2006-11-29 17:28:58 UTC

Post by Robert Orso
I just got a warning about bandwidth mis-usage on the
assp.sourceforge.net project home page. This was caused by the downloads
for the old ClamAV virus database files.
Since Virus-Scanning was completely rebuilt by 1.2.5, the files are not
needed anymore. They are useless anyway, since they are from mid of July
and thus completely outdated.
I opt for deleting them from the project web alltogether.

Not only should they be deleted from the project because of bandwidth
consumption, but because they mislead the user into thinking that
they're useful. Keeping "cruft" like this around only tends to misguide
users into old, outdated, and dysfunctional features. So not only
should the files be deleted, but some up-front documentation needs to be
made plainly visible for those users wanting to use ASSP and ClamAV
together.

I understand the wiki-approach to documentation, and I do not disagree
that it has some benefits. However, I really, truly do not believe that
a wiki-based documentation project can ever truly replace documentation
as-written by the software author, and that the author or someone very
close to the project and the author's development directions needs to
constantly be maintaining the documentation... especially when things
like this ClamAV stuff changes. And then the *primary* set of
documentation made visible to the users should be that which originates
from those software developers, and the wiki stuff should be made secondary.

The most difficult thing that I had to deal with when first installing
and using ASSP was the poor documentation... in particular with the
ClamAV stuff.

Post by Robert Orso
We have still another old feature that is not used but violating the
sourceforge "acceptable use" policy: the greylist. The ASSP does still
include the down- and upload routines, but the list is no more compiled
at the site home. The greylist information is thus outdated too, even if
the user tries its best to keep the list actual and repeatedly fetches
the online version.
I could offer webspace and bandwidth, but I currently have no
possibility to run cron jobs on that web.
Perhaps we should make an effort to relaunch the "ASSP application web"
off the sourcforge "project web" since the latter one must not be used
to offer "services" like the greylist compilation for the running ASSP
installations.
We could revive the greylist and "combined statistics" features when
ASSP would not fetch the final files or uploads directly to the
assp.sourceforge.net web, but instead fetches a short list of mirrors
that would keep the list.
However, we could cancel the feature to up- and download files
periodically to comply with the sourceforge policy.

I don't use this greylist, but I would suggest that you take it down.
And if people are actually using it, then someone will complain and
among them someone should step forward willing to maintain and host it.
They'll likely need to be educated on how to maintain it, but in doing
this you'll end up with another "developer team" member who not only is
eager to help out here, but gains a better sense of purpose with the
project.

Post by Robert Orso
Btw, the files on the sourceforge CVS are outdated even longer. They
have not been updated since 1.2.2 beta over a year ago.
While Fritz Borgstedt does a great job of driving ASSP development, he
keeps the source local. However users keep downloading ancient CVS
snapshots, as they rightfully assume this would be the most current
development state.
If nobody complains, I will upload a recent source to the CVS, even if
it is not used for actual development.

Yes, users rightfully will believe that the CVS source contains
development code. If many people are wanting to use development code,
then I would urge Fritz to cater to this interest (in turn it will
encourage development participation) and move his development source
repository to sourceforge's CVS.

If either there really is not enough interest in the development code to
do this or if Fritz is unwilling to work from CVS, then I would suggest
that the CVS be taken down. However, if you want to look at CVS as
simply a distribution mechanism - then I can understand that. But just
add some documentation to the CVS download that says exactly that and
make it clear that the development code is not publicly available.

Thanks,

Lee.