simplicity vs safety with complexity

[Tom Anderson]

On Mon, 2005-01-24 at 19:49, David Relson wrote:
> I've got a question for y'all.  Would you rather have 
> 
> 1) a wordlist that's simple, easy to backup, but vulnerable to software
> and hardware crashes; or
> 
> 2) a wordlist that offers crash protection but is complex to maintain,
> backup, ... 

I pick:

3) a wordlist that's simple, easy to backup, and offers crash protection

Let's work on that.  For now, I'm still using 0.92.8, and it works
great.  I don't have the time or energy right now to battle with the
problems others are having with transactions.  Could we perhaps try a
different database?  All of my linux systems have MySQL installed... how
about that?  It would fit in great with typical LAMP environments.  Or
maybe Postgre?  Or how about using a running backup where two identical
wordlists are synchronized, a change is made to one, db_verify is run on
it, and if it doesn't verify, resync with the backup, else bring the
backup up to date?

> Now that #2 is working well and people have experience with both
> transactional and non-transactional versions, an informed choice can be
> made.  This choice will affect the default mode for bogofilter 1.0 and
> beyond. 

I haven't used transactions yet in bogofilter.  My opinion is still just
formed from reading posts on this list.  Making transactional databases
in MySQL seems easier though, and you get row-level locking with InnoDB
tables.

> At this point, we need to look forward to bogofilter 1.0 and decide
> which is the preferable default -- old style databases or new style
> databases.  In either case configure's --disable-transactions and
> --enable-transactions options allow a mail admin to select his/her modus
> operandi.

Well, part of the problem is that we've been spoiled with the simple,
easy, vulnerable version.  We want the transaction version to be just as
simple.  If 1.0 launched with transactions as default, new users would
come on board having no other experience, and may just pick it up
quickly.  Or they may give up, uninstall, and bash us on blogs.

Tom