co -l fails: ,v file exists

[Mike Maxwell]

I wanted to co a file that someone else had ci'd in, but I get the following
msg (with the filename changed to protect the guilty):

    co -l foobar.txt
        co: foobar.txt,v: File exists
        co: saved in _0001668

Of course it exists, stupid computer, and I'm trying to check the working
file out!

Originally, all the archive files (the ,v files) were owned by me.  That has
not been a problem for other users, as they have been able to co -l whatever
they needed.  However, I notice that the archive version of the file I'm
trying to co is owned by another user, who had edited the working file and
ci'd it in.  Could this be the problem?  The permissions are the same no
matter who owns the file, namely -r--r--r--.

'co' reports version 5.7; this is under the Cygwin distribution (which makes
it Gnu co, I presume).  I'm running on a Windows2000 machine, and the
archives live on a Solaris system.  The problem doesn't happen if I run the
Solaris 'co', but then I have to be logged into that machine.

The man for rcs talks about an "access list of the RCS file", and appending
names to it.  So far as I know, we are not using access lists, although I
can't figure out how you can tell.

In summary: everyone can "co -l" the files if I own the ,v files; but I
can't "co -l" a file if someone else owns the ,v file.

--
     Mike Maxwell
     Linguistic Data Consortium
     address@hidden