rxvt doesn't accept saveLines more than 32767

[don knuth]

Binary package hint: rxvt

This bug is related to number 237529.

The default number of saveLines is pitifully small; something like 88.
But I use rxvt for all my important computing, lasting over a period of some months while
my computer is always on.

When I reported bug 237529, I'm not sure exactly what I tried, but my
.Xdefaults file now says "XTerm saveLines 100000". That doesn't work, nor
does the command "rxvt -sl 100000". Nor does "rxvt -sl 65535".
I thought I got good results from "rxvt -sl 100000", but I must have been
wrong; because today, when I rebooted for the first time in many months,
that command gives only the default. My machine is not connected to the internet,
and the binaries for rxvt-xterm have not changed in any way, so today's behavior
cannot be different from what I had obtained before. My best guess is
that my previous satisfactory results came from one less zero: "rxvt -sl 10000".

Today, "rxvt -sl 32767" works, and so does "XTerm saveLines 32767" in my
.Xdefaults.

Therefore I conclude that the present implementation uses a "short" integer
for this resource. Presumably the code is left over from the days when it was
unthinkable to have a million bytes of memory to use for "frivolous" things
like history.

I've got rxvt v2.64, Ubuntu 07.10.

Thanks in advance to whoever corrects this anomaly. -- Don Knuth