ZMLEB@SCFVM.BITNET (Lee Brotzman) (01/03/90)
Greetings fellow FIGI-L subscribers:
This letter was originally sent only to the FIGI-L side of the net, not to
Usenet or the recently connected ForthNet electronic bulletin board system.
But, I have since decided that everyone should hear about this, so ...
Let me start with a quick history of FIGI-L. The Forth Interest Group
International List (FIGI-L) began as a mail digest on the BITNET international
computer network by Tamir Weiner at the WEIZMANN node in Israel. When Tamir
was finally overwhelmed with the list, I offered to take over the duties of
moderator of the mailing list. My workload was made much lighter by the
introduction of the LISTSERV mailing list program at my home site,
SCFVM.BITNET.
Through BITNET, FIGI-L was able to reach over 40 countries in Africa,
Asia, Europe, North America and South America, including at least 35 of the
50 United States.
FIGI-L was given a port to the Usenet comp.lang.forth news group through
the good graces of one of the NetGods, Erik Fair at UC Berkeley. Ever since,
FIGI-L has been an integrated part of the Usenet comp.lang.forth mail
system. Just recently, the Forthnet BBS service has begun to post its
messages to Usenet comp.lang.forth. This has resulted in a dramatic change
in the character of FIGI-L.
Since Forthnet has come online, we have lost at least half a dozen FIGI-L
subscribers, probably because of the sudden and unexpected rise in message
frequency. For that I apologize. I knew that ForthNet was coming, and I
should have warned you about it.
Let me quickly describe ForthNet, even though you have probably figured
it out from the mail traffic. ForthNet began as a single IBM PC BBS called
the East Coast Forth Board, which is operated by Jerry Shifrin. Jerry
manages a project that uses Forth to control communications operations for
the MCI telephone company. A few other BBS's came on line, and they agreed
to share their message bases through "virtual" networking (the PC's called
each other late at night and swapped messages).
A commercial electronic bulletin board system called GEnie (General
Electric Network Information Exchange) created an area for Forth programming.
After a while, GEnie traffic was also exchanged with the PC-based BBSs and
the ForthNet was born.
One of the GEnie Forth Roundtable sysops, Gary Smith, collected the Usenet
comp.lang.forth messages, which includes FIGI-L, and began posting them to
ForthNet. Two-way operations were desired and several options were considered.
Now the ForthNet message traffic has come pouring in, which has changed the
character of FIGI-L drastically.
Overall, I think that a two-way door between FIGI-L and the ForthNet is a
good thing. There are still a few bugs to work out, but it seems to me that
things will be running smoothly very soon. The tremendous increase in
traffic creates several problems for your humble Moderator, however.
First, most of you know that I collect the FIGI-L message traffic into
edited digests which are delivered to another list, called FIGI-D. FIGI-D
is not under the direct control of the LISTSERV mailing list processor, like
FIGI-L, but it does use LISTSERV mail distribution services. Before ForthNet,
the FIGI-L Digests were mailed about 3 or 4 times a month. This month I have
had to prepare 10 digests, and ForthNet has been only operating for a few
weeks! Preparing digests is mostly an automatic procedure, and I have
recently increased the power of my automatic formatting procedures, but still
this has translated into more work than I bargained for.
Second, FIGI-L is operated at an U.S. Government computer installation
at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, and funded only with the good graces of
my Government project manager. All of my time given to FIGI-L must be
outside of normal working hours. FIGI-L was approved with the understanding
that the computer charges will be minimal. Well, now FIGI-L is gobbling up
a lot of my precious disk space, preventing me from doing certain things that
I get paid to do. The computer resources required to store, edit, and transmit
FIGI-L messages keeps growing. It won't be long before I am forced to
justify the increased cost.
Finally, I have been Moderator of FIGI-L for almost three years now. I am
starting to grow weary of the constant maintenance of the list. The
increased FIGI-L work load is competing with my pursuit of a Master's degree
in computer science, my other programming projects at home, and my wife and
children.
Therefore, I have come to a decision. FIGI-L must find another home.
I am asking you, the FIGI-L subscribers to help me find that home. The
system requirements are thus: the new site must be an IBM mainframe running
VM/CMS and the LISTSERV mailing list server software package; or the new
moderator must have access to a LISTSERV package at another site. ("Home-brew"
mailing list programs may also be acceptable, but my ability to effect a
smooth transition will be limited.) Direct connection to Internet at the home
site is a definite advantage. The new moderator must be prepared to spend 1-2
hours a week in list maintenance, which is mostly keeping track of bounced mail
(I see several bounces a day; there is always at least one gateway down
somewhere).
The FIGI-L Digests do not need to be created and distributed by the FIGI-L
moderator. Anyone can do the Digests, but if your computer is running
LISTSERV, the distribution will be much easier. Each digest takes maybe a
half an hour to generate from the FIGI-L mail messages, edit, and transmit.
If there are no volunteers for taking over FIGI-L, the list may come to
an abrupt halt. I can not justify spending tax dollars at the rate I have
been over the last month, and I fear that the plug will be pulled soon.
I hope that a suitable site for FIGI-L can be found. I would hate to
lose the list. Thank you for taking the time to read my message.
Sincerely,
Lee Brotzman (FIGI-L Moderator)
-- BITNET: ZMLEB@SCFVM
-- Internet: zmleb@scfvm.gsfc.nasa.gov