Re: pine

[Shane Beasley <sbeasley@cs.uic.edu>]

On Thu, 27 Dec 2001, Christian Surchi wrote:

> Probably you can only use "apt source". We have debian sources in
> non-free pool.

I understand that is currently the only way. However, I was saying that I
think it would be nice to be able to download a binary package without
having to build it... It saves one from having build problems like fellow
Debian user Martin was having.

> But the best choice is abandoning non-free software for mutt. :)

>From my experience, Mutt has a learning curve and some RTFM attached to
it, unlike Pine.

Case in point: My university promotes telnet/Pine as the de facto MUA,
even though most of the campus network is Windows-centric (the back-end is
Unix, of course). While I won't defend their choice of operating system or
remote login protocol, I will point out that, with that many lusers on
Pine, it can't possibly be that difficult to use. :)

On the other hand, I've played with Mutt enough to realize that I need to
play around with it a lot more before I get the hang of it. Old habits die
hard, after all.

Perhaps that might make a good idea for a future GNU project -- a Free
clone of Pine, or maybe just dumb down Mutt's interface. Not that it
matters much to me either way, for I don't particularly need that kind of
freedom just to check my mail...

- Shane