pag@hao.UUCP (Peter Gross) (11/24/83)
> Here is my thought. Lets set a limit on the NUMBER of usenet topics that > can be available at any one time (say, 100, or 150, or whatever is > agreeable). After that limit is reached, anytime someone wants to create a > new topic, they must also suggest what old, decrepit, unused topic can be > zapped to make room for it. If everyone can agree to it, then it is so > done. If not, then it isn't. I just don't think this is the right approach. The proliferation of newsgroups is not necessarily a bad thing -- it helps categorize and isolate discussions, making it easier for news readers to filter out what doesn't interest them. If the news software can't handle it, then the fault lies in the software. Future versions of news should place a heavy emphasis on making the news system's performance and operation relatively independent of the number of groups. The current method of using a separate directory for each group is a definite step in the right direction. The only real drawback is the limitation on the size of the group name (and of course, disk space -- but that will be a problem under any version). --peter
alb@alice.UUCP (11/24/83)
Artificial limits are senseless. There is no reason to limit something as long as resources are available (and available without people grumbling). The current 'limit' is the number of lines in the .newsrc file (512), an internal (to readnews) memory limit. Why make it less than that?
chuqui@cae780.UUCP (11/28/83)
I just don't think this is the right approach. The proliferation
of newsgroups is not necessarily a bad thing -- it helps categorize
and isolate discussions, making it easier for news readers to filter
out what doesn't interest them. If the news software can't handle
it, then the fault lies in the software. Future versions of news
should place a heavy emphasis on making the news system's performance
and operation relatively independent of the number of groups. The
current method of using a separate directory for each group is a definite
step in the right direction. The only real drawback is the limitation
on the size of the group name (and of course, disk space -- but that
will be a problem under any version).
In theory I tend to agree with Peter. Newsgroups are not a bad thing. In
reality, however, there tends to be a number of newsgroups that have
outlived their usefulness (my mind immediately wanders to net.wobegon and
net.games.pacman). What I am suggesting is a way to get people to look at
what the system has and decide what can be done away with while minimizing
the loss of usefulness of the system. Its always possible to have someone
who administrates this thing (like Mark Horton or myself or some appointed
group) go through and occasionally clean up the out of date topics, but I
prefer to allow the people to govern themselves and allow as many voices as
possible to help decide.
I am not trying to make up for software limitations or anything else. I am
just looking at ways to make sure that topics that are not being used are
(eventually) recycled. If a decision is made to limit things to (say) 100
topics, and a day comes that we have 100 good topics, the limit can always
be raised. I am not suggesting arbitrariness, just thought. If nothing
else, this might make people interested in a severely underused topic (such
as net.wobegon) realize that it exists and resurrect it. If it doesn't, do
we really need it anyway?
If someone has a better idea on how to get rid of anitquated newsgroups,
please speak up!
--
From the dungeons of the warlock: {amd70 qubix}!cae780!chuqui
Chuqui the Plaid *pif*phil@amd70.UUCP (11/30/83)
Be serious. You expect the USENET community to reach agreement on ANYTHING?
Incidentally, we've been seeing around a half megabyte per day of news.
Any oldtimers out there have a feel for what the volume was six months
ago, or a year? Just curious.
--
Phil Ngai (408) 988-7777 {ucbvax|decwrl|ihnp4|allegra}!amd70!philmark@cbosgd.UUCP (12/01/83)
The last time this debate came up, the consensus was that we should improve the software to be able to handle any number of newsgroups, rather than limit our total number. Since 2.10, the number of newsgroups has not made much difference to system performance, although the number 512 is built into the software as a max. I suspect that the major consequence of havings lots of newsgroups is that the list is long for a new person to plow through. Thus, a newsgroup should have some benefit to exist, but not much is needed, so long as it already exists. It might be appropriate to go through the list and propose that those newsgroups which no longer are used be removed. I suspect there are a few in this category. But this should be viewed as housecleaning, if there are even a few users the group should remain. Mark Horton