Re: [syndication] Re: XML-RPC and the Need to Cash In

[Dan Brickley <daniel.brickley@bristol.ac.uk>]

On Sun, 26 Aug 2001, Morbus Iff wrote:

> >Here's an idea I had a long time ago: if someone is linking to
> >something you've already read, don't display that entry (or
> >relegate it to lower status).
>
> Well, the problem with browser based systems like Radio Userland and
> AmphetaDesk is that you can't determine what someone has read, unless tell
> you, like in Radio Userland (by clicking that little checkbox).

For desktop apps, how about looking at the user's Web browser history
files, to figure out whether they've visited it via some other route?
Offhand I don't know the feasibility of doing this for common browsers,
nor if anyone has already done this.

[rummages...]

Netscape 4 under Windows seems to use a BerkeleyDB file:

	cd /mnt/win/Program Files/Netscape/Users/daniel_brickley
	[pldab@(none) daniel_brickley]$ file netscape.hst
	netscape.hst: Berkeley DB Hash file (Version 2, Little Endian, Bucket Size
	4096, Bucket Shift 12, Directory Size 256, Segment Size 256, Segment Shift
	8, Overflow Point 1, Last Freed 2, Max Bucket 1, High Mask 0x3, Low Mask
	0x1, Fill Factor 65536, Number of Keys 0)

similar in Linux:

	cd /home/pldab/.netscape
	[pldab@(none) .netscape]$ file history.dat
	history.dat: Berkeley DB Hash file (Version 2, Little Endian, Bucket Size
	4096, Bucket Shift 12, Directory Size 256, Segment Size 256, Segment Shift
	8, Overflow Point 6, Last Freed 6, Max Bucket 49, High Mask 0x3f, Low Mask
	0x1f, Fill Factor 43, Number of Keys 1873)


...should be possible to rummage in these and find out where people have
visited.

Opera's (Linux) is a text file, ~/.opera/historyrc

I've no idea how IE does things.

Plausible?

--danbri