Someone e-mailed some questions about searching the hp3000-l archives
that I received on my computer at home and I don't remember the origin
address (ooops) but this may be of general relevance to all:

If you mail search requests to [log in to unmask] (as opposed to the
web interface) I was asked how to make a search string "continuation
line".  In the "old" job-oriented search, you just stuck a hyphen on the
end of a line and started on the next.  The other question was how to
have more than 100 hits returned from a search.  I didn't know the
answer to either one so I asked LSoft and just got the answers.

> Under VM, you executed the LISTSERV command called DATABASE and
> provided it with a set of search instructions to execute.  The
> new database function is a LISTSERV command (SEARCH) that you
> invoke directly. The standard LISTSERV command continuation rules
> apply, and the special database continuation rules do not. So, you
> can do:
>
> // search * in hp3000-l since nov 96 ,
> // where subject contains 2680

The "standard continuation rules" are to start off with a "// " and then
your command, a comma, and the continuation.  Anything to the left of
the comma is preserved and tacked onto the next line (thus the extra
space before the comma).  I tried it, it works.

As for the 100 hits business:
> Not currently, but you can order the next 100 hits with something
> like:
>
> SEARCH whatever IN HP3000-L.nnn- WHERE whatever
>
> 'nnn' would be the number of the last returned hit, plus one.

Jeff Kell <[log in to unmask]>