> I'd link to the message in google groups, but google crippled their groups search functionality a couple years back so finding the message in their archives even when you know the message id and the exact date is unreasonably difficult these days.
I still don't understand why Google made searching the Usenet archive impossible to do.
Some important bits of computing history lurk in those archives and Google just has it all boxed up. The future people are going to shake their fists and wonder why all that information is really hard to get to.
Search group for "linus posix". On first response, click the 'No really, search for "linus posix" button, to discard the helpful "linux posix" correction.
Look at 23 message subjects lines and arrive here:
That convoluted process works for that single exact message.
What if you want to search for the early appearance of some two word phrase on Usenet? This used to be easy. It can't (as far as I can tell) be done now.
And that convoluted process is -considering Google has excellent search engine- a fucking stupid mess.
I still don't understand why Google made searching the Usenet archive impossible to do.
Some important bits of computing history lurk in those archives and Google just has it all boxed up. The future people are going to shake their fists and wonder why all that information is really hard to get to.