Re: LYNX-DEV 2.7 release.

[Foteos Macrides]

Andrew Kuchling <address@hidden> wrote:
>> So I'm all for it.  I'd say a scheduled release date of about February 15
>> would be good.  I guess what that would mean is that no new
>> "functionality" goes in and everyone tries to concentrate on tweaking
>[...]
>       * It should be possible to #ifdef out cookie support
>completely, for low-memory situations where it isn't wanted; someone
>requested this soon after the cookie patch was announced.  I can work
>on this tomorrow and produce a patch.

        It think that's highly ill-advised and should not be done.

        I put a great deal of effort into making the cookie support
maximally memory-efficient, I also added functions which are or will
be common to Lynx's overall HTTP/1.1 support.  The code specific
to cookie support which could be #ifdef'ed out makes a piddling
contribution to the Lynx image, and would simply complicate future
development efforts.  Someone already tried #ifdef'ing this or that
out for "low-memory situations", and didn't drawn a good inference
from the result, but that "experiment" should not be repeated on
the entire Lynx community in the final hours of putting out a
release.

        The present "within session cookie support" does not pose a
security risk to any site offering Lynx, i.e., is not in the same
category as lynxexec, lynxprog, lynxcfg, and some aspects of DIRED
support.  Any "threat" is to the user's privacy, which is why prompting
for a 'Y'es (this cookie only) or 'A'lways (any cookie from this site)
should always be present (unless 'A'lways of ne'V'er have been set for
the site) together with the ability to change the 'accept' settings via
the Cookie Jar Page.  For people not in a position to download the
entire FM distribution, I put links in the http://www.wfbr.edu/dir/lynx
and http://www.slcc.edu/lynx/fote/ index pages for accessing the FM online
'h'elp, where you can read the sections on "Lynx State Management" and
the "Cookie Jar Page" via the Users Guide.  This minimal level of support
for State Management is now expected of browsers, just as is authentication
support, and it make no more sense to #ifdef it out than to #ifdef out
the authentication support (which, instead, needs to be expanded!).

        I also caution Subir consistently to include the phrase "within
session" with announce cookie support in Lynx, and warn that any happiness
this invokes will very soon be replaced by disappointment that it doen't
also offer inter-session cookie support.

                                Fote

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 Foteos Macrides            Worcester Foundation for Biomedical Research
 address@hidden         222 Maple Avenue, Shrewsbury, MA 01545
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