15 Jan
2026
15 Jan
'26
12:54 a.m.
On 2026-01-14 08:41, Johnny Billquist wrote:
On 14/01/2026 14.36, Keith Halewood wrote:
My RSTS/E Finger server allows customization of this via
its configuration file's "W" option:
! W - The minimum number of non-wildcard characters allowed for lookups.
A
! value of 0 will allow any match, 1 needs at least one non-wild
char-
! acter, etc.
If you don't meet the setting, you get "?No such user"
unless your request exactly matches a username.
I have the beginnings of a DECnet finger server
for VMS in Pascal,
which will produce summary information for who's logged, when, what
they're doing and where they're doing it
from and also specific information for matched users if supplied as a
parameter, including plan and the read/unread status of their mailbox.
I won't do "poor man's routing"
and I'm tempted to restrict the breadth of partial searches to a
complete username and/or complete word components of a user's real
name.
This is also something I'd happily leave to each implementation. PMR
or not - up to each implementation. Just give some sort of error if
you don't allow it. Same with user matching.