xanthian@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG (Kent Paul Dolan) (12/03/90)
[This is a repost, with just a couple of typos fixed up, and modified to
match the second call for votes instead of the first, of the same
article posted with the first call for votes, to make sure this is
online along with the second call for votes on systems that expire news
fast. Those who have already voted or already read the earlier posting
can safely skip this one; there's nothing new in here. Kent.]
This is a companion article to the "Second CALL FOR VOTES, comp.sys.amiga
reorganization" article recently posted by the moderator of
news.announce.newgroups. It is a modification (mostly deletions) of the
CFD3 article posted about three weeks ago. It includes some commentary
on the discussion in the intervening weeks, including summary of name
choice issues.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
SUMMARY
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Retain comp.sys.amiga.games
Retain comp.sys.amiga.hardware
Create comp.sys.amiga.misc (renames comp.sys.amiga)
Create comp.sys.amiga.programmer (renames comp.sys.amiga.tech)
Create comp.sys.amiga.announce (moderated)
Create comp.sys.amiga.reviews (moderated)
Create comp.sys.amiga.introduction (monitored)
Create comp.sys.amiga.audio
Create comp.sys.amiga.graphics
Create comp.sys.amiga.marketplace
Create comp.sys.amiga.multimedia
Create comp.sys.amiga.applications
Create comp.sys.amiga.emulations
Create comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Create comp.sys.amiga.datacomm
Create comp.unix.amiga
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
GOALS
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroup comp.sys.amiga carries 1000-1200 articles per week, and half
again as many articles as the next highest article count newsgroup on
USENet. This volume of news traffic in a single newsgroup causes
problems: for sysops maintaining news software, for such simple tasks as
listing the articles or creating a command line containing the article
names, for readers receiving the group by email, for readers using less
sophisticated news reading software, and for readers trying to keep up
with just important events, or just a subset of the discussions.
The purpose of this proposal is to partition comp.sys.amiga massively,
so that its subgroups are the average size of other USENet newsgroups,
and carry perhaps one tenth the current traffic, organized for easier
subscription and reading. It is not anticipated that the kind or
quantity of articles will change, merely their organization.
In addition, to hasten propagation of the change, comp.sys.amiga will be
removed as a newsgroup, and replaced by comp.sys.amiga.misc, to follow
the pattern of other leafy heirarchies. Also, comp.sys.amiga.tech will
be renamed comp.sys.amiga.programmer to divert the current inappropriate
hardware oriented postings back to comp.sys.amiga.hardware.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PROPOSAL
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
comp.sys.amiga.misc
The c.s.a.* general talk group. Post a multifaceted new thread here in
preference to crossposting. Crossposted articles within the c.s.a.*
groups should use this group as the Followup-To line entry. This group
replaces comp.sys.amiga, which will no longer be a newsgroup, just a
news heirarchy node.
comp.sys.amiga.announce
Moderated: Fred_Fish-disks, meetings, new products, product updates,
shareware releases, uploads to archives, tool bug reports, and other
formal announcements go here. A fuller charter has been posted. This
new group will be created.
comp.sys.amiga.reviews
Moderated, archived: where to put your formal reviews of new stuff for
the Amiga: hardware and freeware, shareware, or commercial serious and
game software. A fuller charter has been posted. This new group will
be created. There will be guidelines for review format.
comp.sys.amiga.introduction
Monitored: This is where neophytes get introduced to the c.s.a.* groups,
and to the Amiga, and where experienced people can read and write
answers to common questions. Frequently asked questions postings, how
to use the c.s.a.* groups, and other standard and slow expiring
postings, also newusers questions and the answers to them from
sympathetic gurus go here. The goal is that all "normal operation"
questions (non-broken hardware, non-buggy software) and answers go here
rather than in the more technical groups. This new group will be
created.
comp.sys.amiga.hardware
Hardware developers', hobbyists', and users' "smell of solder" shop talk
and assistance forum. This existing group is retained, but formal
product reviews are diverted to c.s.a.reviews, and hardware discussions
that formerly landed in c.s.a.tech are directed here.
comp.sys.amiga.programmer
Software developers' and programming hobbyists' "code cobbling" shop
talk and assistance forum. This renames existing group c.s.a.tech to
better focus the desired traffic.
comp.sys.amiga.games
Talking about buying and playing games; casual reviews and discussions
go on here. This existing group is retained, but archival quality games
reviews should go to c.s.a.reviews, "used games for sale" ads should go
to c.s.a..marketplace, and games software design discussions should go
to c.s.a.programmer or rec.games.programmer.
comp.sys.amiga.audio
Music applications, MIDI, synthesized speech, voice input, sampled and
synthesized sound discussions go here. This new group will be created.
comp.sys.amiga.graphics
Charts, graphs, screen hacks, ray tracing, using graphics standards on
the Amiga (Renderman, PHIGS, GKS, CGM, Postscript, PIC, X windows), and
other still picture or completely non-serious graphics discussions go
here. Image packaging discussions also belong here or in
c.s.a.datacomm, depending on graphics or data compression focus. This
new group will be created.
comp.sys.amiga.multimedia
Animations, video, television, and multimedia combinations of them with
graphics and music and speech. The showcase for the Amiga's five years
as the television studio microcomputer multimedia platform of choice.
This new group will be created.
comp.sys.amiga.applications
The rest of the applications software discussions: business
productivity, desk top publishing, personal finance, TeX, METAFONT,
Postscript, fonts, printer drivers, word processing, utilities, hacks,
etc. Commercial, shareware and freeware non-games, non-multimedia
software applications talk. How to use, how to interface, and so on.
This new group will be created; if there is enough business oriented
material to justify a further split, c.s.a.productivity may be created
later by a separate vote.
comp.sys.amiga.marketplace
Mail order and retail vendor reviews and horror stories, where to find
it, where to get good prices, informal product ratings; talk about
buying and selling stuff for the Amiga. Personal Amiga hardware and
software "for sale" and "wanted" ads go here too, since it seems
impossible to divert people who want an Amiga oriented audience for
their ads into posting them to misc.forsale.computers. A fuller charter
has been posted. This new group will be created.
comp.sys.amiga.emulations
Discussions of the several hardware and software emulations of other
computers (Mac, IBM-PC, Atari, C64, Apple 2 series, and more) that run
on/in (software/hardware emulations, respectively) the Amiga. Includes
discussions of games and applications running only under the emulations,
since they are not of interest to the rest of the Amiga community. This
new group will be created.
comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
The large number of long lasting threads about "here's why the Amiga is
better than Brand W (and vice versa)"; "here's what the other folks are
doing and how the Amiga compares"; "why doesn't the Amiga have this
Brand-X computer feature", "Commodore should add feature Y (at no
additional cost)", "Commodore should recall everything and fix problem
Z", benchmarks comparing Amigas to Amigas and to other platforms;
rumors, (lack of) marketing complaints and suggestions for new ads, and
general "do it better" ranting go here. This _vital_ new newsgroup will
be created, and let me be the first to say: "Take it to .advocacy!
comp.sys.amiga.datacomm
General byte passing and the Amiga. BBS software, terminal emulators
and other modem software ({xpr,}{u,x,y,z}modem, kermit, etc.), ftp,
networking, creating, using, and passing archives (arc, zoo, lharc,
lhwarp, pkazip, compress, uuencode and uudecode, etc.), downloading and
uploading text and binary files, email and news, sharing software and
data, compression methods, archive site pointers, general machine to
machine stuff. DNET, UUCP, PARNET, Ethernet, etc. too. This new group
will be created.
comp.unix.amiga
Amiga Minix and Unix SYSV4 and successors, all Amiga specific aspects will
be discussed here. This new group will be created. Later subdivision is
possible.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
DISCUSSION
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1) A little chat about the proposed groups and their names and placement.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
comp.sys.amiga.misc
This is the net standard "chat" subgroup name for groups that have
leafed. By creating this and removing c.s.a as a target for postings,
we force an immediate upgrade across the net; the proposal, once
newgrouped and rmgrouped, can't be "put off for later". This also has
some news software and general tidiness niceness for users; there won't
be a group that contains both articles and directories, so scripts can
be simpler. Post here to reach general c.s.a.* readership, rather than
crossposting to several other subgroups, if at all possible. This will
be a big win for all subscribers. The intention of having so many
subgroups is that this group be small, not large, so that everyone can
afford to read it. Whenever possible, post to a single, more specific
group. If you crosspost to several groups, direct followups to, and
hold the discussion, here.
comp.sys.amiga.announce
This seems highly popular; it will probably be the most read group.
Think of it as the executive summary of c.s.a.*.
comp.sys.amiga.reviews
This seemed highly popular, also. Having it archived should make the
search for information on products easier and faster, and, if we can
educate c.s.a.* subscribers to look there first, cut down on a lot of
postings.
comp.sys.amiga.introduction
This name seems fairly well accepted now, modulo a couple of people
who'd like the shorter .intro. Per my previous plan, I want to use full
English words where no prior standard exists, for the sake of
subscribers in non-English speaking countries. The FAQ postings could
also go to .announce, but I think having them here with the newbie
"help" interaction is best placement, as it gives one group a new user
can explore and inhabit until comfortable with the net.
We are also trying something that may be new on the net, an assigned
newsgroup monitor. Not a moderator, because the moderation overhead
would damp the utility of the group as a question and answer forum.
Just a person assigned to post general behavior notices for the new
folks, send email to suggest individual corrections, and notice when a
question has become "frequently asked" and needs to go in the periodic
postings. We'll try this for a while and see how the group and the
assigned monitor react. Think of it as one person doing newsgroup
post-moderation.
comp.sys.amiga.applications
This name seems popular, again modulo the slow typists. There are a few
calls to split out a business oriented group, but the traffic isn't there
to justify a further split just now. Maybe next year.
comp.sys.amiga.hardware
This should get a little more of its appropriate traffic now that .tech
is renamed and c.s.a is going away. This is one of my favorite groups,
because it is one whose content I rarely read, and I can find the things
I do want to read just by reading the subject lines. While it's
dreadfully unfair to have one hardware group and all these software
groups, the fact of the matter is that the number of folks competent to
hack hardware is much smaller.
comp.sys.amiga.programmer
Renames c.s.a.tech; this should eliminate the stuff appropriate for
c.s.a.hardware, while still focusing the discussion around software
develop{ers,ment}. This name seems most popular, though ".programming"
has been suggested a couple of times. I think there is precedent in
some other microcomputer groups for the current choice.
comp.sys.amiga.games
My baby! ;-) Needs to propagate a little better to match the current
c.s.a distribution, and I'm trying to get in touch with the
amiga-relay@udel.edu folks to get the relay subdivided, so games stuff
from them doesn't end up in c.s.a [It looks like this is a GO!]; this is
another reason to newgroup c.s.a.misc and nuke c.s.a. Anyway, the
current success at damping games postings to c.s.a shows what a good
idea partitioning c.s.a is; there are lots of people using this group,
but also lots joyful _not_ to read its contents in the main group any
more. There are enough ".games specific" where to buy postings that they
go here, rather than in c.s.a.marketplace.
comp.sys.amiga.marketplace
Name changed again as noted above. The main purpose of the group to be
is an information source about products and vendors, but the main
newsgroup creation discussion will undoubtedly concern the ads.
Some will still suggest using the netwide misc.forsale.computers group,
but 1) no one does, because they want to target an Amiga audience; 2)
this will get the ads out of c.s.a.misc by creating an obvious correct
place to put them, and to read when you want them; 3) there will be a
lot of Amiga specific vendor discussions here. Please DO NOT crosspost
ads to _any_ other newsgroup; that's obnoxious and you'll get flamed,
deservedly. This is not the place for marketing rants, see new group
c.s.a.advocacy.
comp.sys.amiga.audio
Music software, MIDI interfaces, sampled sound, and score sources are a
heavy traffic part of c.s.a; the .audio name was chosen rather than
.music so speech, game noises and other non-music topics would find a
home here too. This group was pulled out of c.s.a.multimedia at the
request of the Amiga Hypermedia mailing list operator, whose more than
100 subscribers would like to participate in a more focused multimedia
group.
comp.sys.amiga.graphics
Ray tracing has become a hot topic, especially with the 68030 boards,
and there is a long running low volume thread about data presentation
graphics. The Amiga's general utility as a graphics machine, and all the
built in graphics coprocessors, make this a long running discussion
area. This group was also pulled out of c.s.a.multimedia at the request
of the Amiga Hypermedia mailing list operator, for the same reason.
comp.sys.amiga.multimedia
The support for separating out the graphics and audio was late arriving,
but when it came, it was overwhelming; there are enough people eager to
participate in this group in just one mailing list to justify the group,
not to mention the heavy ongoing traffic about independent and corporate
hypermedia use of the Amiga. I decided to put the print media stuff in
c.s.a.applications, though; comments?
comp.sys.amiga.emulations
The support for this has grown a lot since the last posting. There are
several who suggested bundling this in with what is now c.s.a.advocacy,
but I'm not going to. Emulation discussions are a legitimate topic of
high value to the folks doing emulations, they are just of limited
interest to the rest ot the group. I don't find it fair to dump the
emulations people into the general ranting of c.s.a.advocacy.
comp.sys.amiga.advocacy
Name changed; best one I've found yet, suggestions still welcome; this
beats .compare, .futures, .rumors, .suggest, .influence, and several
other fairly pejorative ideas seen so far. The outbreaks of "why the
Amiga should be a {Mac, PS/2, Atari-tt, NeXT, and so on}" postings are
episodic, as are the real benchmark postings, and the "why Commodore
should add feature X at no additional cost" postings, but when they hit,
they're hell, so let's give them and the "what the Amiga needs to adopt
from new technology" a place here. There's no perfect name but this one
_is_ a grand magnet for the c.s.a.*-specific version of
alt.religion.computers. Notice that at least the benchmarks, and some
of the ad suggestions, are moderately legitimate traffic, and that the
group is justified by the volume of traffic, not by its quality.
comp.sys.amiga.datacomm
A couple of people, a day apart, suggested folding terminal emulators,
Ethernet, DNET, Amiga UUCP, Amiga FIDONET, file archivers, packing
uploads, unpacking downloads, ftp questions, data transfer
({x,y,z}modem, kermit, etc.), and archive site locating threads in one
subgroup; arranged that way, there's plenty of traffic to justify a
separate subgroup. I chose .datacomm instead of .telecomm to reflect
the large data packaging component, when I put the subgroup back into
this proposal.
Henrik Clausen made the excellent point that _every_ USENet subscriber
accessing the net from an Amiga is in some sense interested in this
thread, since that's how the newsgroups are accessed, so it should be in
the current proposed partition.
comp.unix.amiga
The A3000UX is in the hands of developers, and undergoing a large
university department wide beta test, and there is a lot of traffic
about it in c.s.a.*, already. By the time this proposal is enacted, the
A3000UX will be street hardware/software, if all goes well on both
sides. There are perhaps thousands of the machines in the field by now,
hundreds for sure, and the level of existing discussion already
justifies a subgroup, in any case.
Similarly, the MINIX port to the Amiga is released, and needs a home for
Amiga specific issues (such as getting an HD device driver written!)
The low traffic involved can coexist with the SYSV4 traffic for now.
This group should, as Bill Vermillion noted, get the Amiga specific Unix
or MINIX postings.
The generic MINIX stuff should be discussed in comp.os.minix. The
generic Unix stuff should be discussed in one of the many comp.unix
groups (comp.unix.{admin,internals,programmer}, for example).
2) The capture and care of moderators.
--------------------------------------
The moderators' job is to filter (pass on the suitability of) postings,
and to add appropriate Followup-To: target newsgroups to postings.
We have at least these volunteers:
zerkle@iris.ucdavis.edu (Dan Zerkle) Sacremento, California
HONP9@jetson.uh.edu (Jason L. Tibbits III) Houston, Texas
mwm#decwrl.dec.com (Mike Meyer) Palo Alto, California
They have sorted things out among themselves; Dan will do .announce,
Jason will do .reviews, and Mike will act as backup to both and as a
"moderator of last resort" when one of the other moderators and a
prospective poster can't agree on the suitability of a posting.
3) The concept of a monitor.
----------------------------
Lack of skill and bad posting habits are endemic on the net, and we may
be no more successful at improving things than anywhere else, but we
have a volunteer willing to try. Since c.s.a.introduction is the best
prospect for teaching correct habits early, we are going to install a
monitor, who will be in charge of writing posting guidelines,
admonishing the bad tempered, instructing the unskilled, maintaining the
periodic postings, and generally watching over the newsgroup. Ferry de
Jong (ferry@chorus.fr) has volunteered to take on the task. Wish him
luck and a calm temper.
4) Namespace questions.
-----------------------
Considering the vast quantity of readers among news.groups,
news.announce.newgroups, comp.sys.amiga, comp.sys.amiga.tech,
comp.sys.amiga.hardware and comp.sys.amiga.games, the groups where the
first (CFD3) netwide discussion posting was made, there have been
surprisingly few complaints about the proposed names. As I stated in
my earlier CFD3 posting, only a massive protest about a name would be
considered; there were instead a dribble of postings and email. On
the guess that this represents general approval / apathy /
"good-enough"-ism rather than general lack of posting knowledge, the
names as proposed in CFD3 have been retained unchanged, per my "little
tin dictator" proclaimations in earlier postings.
For namespace freaks, here is the actual scorecard among both postings
and email seen in answer to the CFD3 name choices up to the time of the
first call for votes. Sorry if I missed anyone. Equal numbers of
postings in favor of these same CFD3 name suggestions, and general "I
love it all" postings are not included, just the objections.
comp.sys.amiga.advocacy -- seven objectors
peter@sugar.hackercorp.com (Peter da Silva)
>Perhaps alt.religion.amiga
>I proposed ".futures"
Ed McGuire <emcguire@cadfx.ccad.uiowa.edu>
>may I suggest ... "c.s.a.evangelism"
rickert@mp.cs.niu.edu (Neil Rickert)
>Probably should be 'alt.religion'.
srp@modcomp.uucp (Steve Pietrowicz)
>[probably will regret having "amiga" in the name.]
jhenders@jonh.wimsey.bc.ca (John Henders)
>comp.wars ... is really what we all need
Paul-Andre Panon <panon@ucs.ubc.ca>
>Why not just call it Comp.sys.amiga.Marc-Barrett? ;-)
apple!tardis.Tymnet.COM!carl (Carl Baltrunas)
>I suggest to you, comp.sys.amiga.alternatives
comp.sys.amiga..applications -- two objectors
Ran Atkinson <randall@Virginia.EDU>
>This should really be named comp.sys.amiga.apps
ked01@JUTS.ccc.amdahl.com (Kim DeVaughn)
>I would prefer "apps"
comp.sys.amiga.emulations -- one objector
lear@cerc.utexas.edu (Jim Lear)
>How does "c.s.a.compatible" or "c.s.a.compatability" sound
comp.sys.amiga.introduction -- nine objectors
peter@sugar.hackercorp.com (Peter da Silva)
>How about "comp.sys.amiga.newusers" or "comp.sys.amiga.questions"?
peter@sugar.hackercorp.com (Peter da Silva)
>call these sorts of groups "newusers" or "questions".
Ed McGuire <emcguire@cadfx.ccad.uiowa.edu>
>Why not c.s.a.newusers?
davidsen@crdos1.crd.ge.COM (Wm E Davidsen Jr)
>I don't much care for the name... new-users [and] new-readers [instead].
gerber@leddev.enet.dec.com (Robert M. Gerber)
>Do we need a CSA.Novice?
barrett.UNDEED@f4.n494.z5.fidonet.org (barrett UNDEED)
>why not call it comp.sys.amiga.questions?
peter@sugar.hackercorp.com (Peter da Silva)
>I'm still waiting for a decent charter for comp.sys.amiga.introduction
>that doesn't apply as well or better to more conventional name like
>.newusers or .questions.
myb100@csc.anu.oz.au (Markus Buchhorn)
>comp.sys.amiga.newreaders (or .newnetreaders, but that's too long)
epeterso@houligan.encore.com (Eric Peterson)
>.questions is a much better choice
myb100@csc.anu.oz.au (Markus Buchhorn)
>[agreed with .questions, I think]
zerkle@iris.ucdavis.edu (Dan Zerkle)
>You could call the .introduction group comp.sys.amiga.warthog, for
>all I care, just so long as the group exists!
epeterso@houligan.encore.com (Eric Peterson)
>The name ".questions" is much more positive
comp.unix.amiga -- one objector
Ran Atkinson <randall@Virginia.EDU>
> should be comp.unix.sysv.amiga
So far as I found, there were no objections after CFD3 to the _names_ of
the other proposed groups.
Having read this, please take the time to find the ballot posting in
news.announce.newgroups and vote -- tell all your friends to do the
same.
/// It's Amiga
/// for me: why
Kent, the man from xanth. \\\/// settle for
<xanthian@Zorch.SF-Bay.ORG> <xanthian@well.sf.ca.us> \XX/ anything less?
--
Convener, ongoing comp.sys.amiga grand reorganization.