spaf@gatech.CSNET (Gene Spafford) (07/30/85)
(My apologies to readers of net.news.group if you see this twice -- inews
barfed when I tried to feed this to all 14 groups at once).
I just recently deleted a number of newsgroups that had seen minimal or
no use in the last few months. Since that time, I have gotten mail
from a few people suggesting other candidates for removal based on
their lack of activity. It seems to make sense that if we won't create
a new newsgroup without an indication of potential use, there is no
justification for keeping newsgroups which get no significant use after
creation.
Site "gatech" has a news history of about 3 years. That is, all our
newsgroup numbering started when we came on the net about 3 years ago.
Thus, I have a pretty good indication of overall activity on a
newsgroup by checking our active file.
The following newsgroups have had little use recently and less than 150
articles in the last three years. For many of the groups, that
includes their entire lifespan. Additionally, it appears that anywhere
from 1/2 to 2/3 of the articles posted to many of these groups are
cross-posted to other, currently active groups. There seems to be
little need to keep these groups around.
Unless someone provides me with a good reason not to, I will be
removing the following groups on or about August 15:
net.bugs.v7
net.decus
net.games.go
net.lang.apl
net.math.symbolic
net.micro.432
net.notes
net.rec.birds
net.rec.scuba
net.rec.skydive
net.std
net.theater
net.usoft
--
Gene "4 months and counting" Spafford
The Clouds Project, School of ICS, Georgia Tech, Atlanta GA 30332
CSNet: Spaf @ GATech ARPA: Spaf%GATech.CSNet @ CSNet-Relay.ARPA
uucp: ...!{akgua,allegra,hplabs,ihnp4,linus,seismo,ulysses}!gatech!spafpreece@ccvaxa.UUCP (08/01/85)
I don't think net.notes has been all THAT quiet. In any case, I don't think there's any other appropriate place for the material that does get circulated here. Personally, I would prefer to see software automatically delete groups when they have been inactive for a set period of time (without deleting archives) and automatically create groups the first time traffic arrives for them. Within the current structure of the network I would not EVER want to see some other site be able to remove a group on our system.
wombat@ccvaxa.UUCP (08/05/85)
If it prevents just one site from sending out "Orphaned Responses," don't you think net.notes would be justified? Eventually Ray Essick will graduate, and it will be up to the other notes users of the net to maintain and improve the software, and to track compatibility with news. If you don't like the fact that it's a top level group, how about net.news.notes? "When you are about to die, a wombat is better than no company at all." Roger Zelazny, *Doorways in the Sand* Wombat ihnp4!uiucdcs!ccvaxa!wombat
spaf@gatech.CSNET (Gene Spafford) (08/13/85)
I have posted a summary of responses to this article in net.news.group.
The article id is <813@gatech.CSNET>
--
Gene "4 months and counting" Spafford
The Clouds Project, School of ICS, Georgia Tech, Atlanta GA 30332
CSNet: Spaf @ GATech ARPA: Spaf%GATech.CSNet @ CSNet-Relay.ARPA
uucp: ...!{akgua,allegra,hplabs,ihnp4,linus,seismo,ulysses}!gatech!spaf