kjones@talos.uucp (Kyle Jones) (11/16/89)
rms@AI.MIT.EDU writes: > The principal purpose of info-gnu-emacs (a.k.a. gnu.emacs) is to > convey announcements and polls on behalf of the GNU project to the > users of GNU Emacs. > [...] > In other words, not for discussions and not for asking for help. I think the name gnu.emacs is very mislading to the typical USENET reader. I know that gnu.* != USENET, but the difference is not readily apparent to newcomers (slag? :-)). The typical reader sees comp.emacs, and assumes gnu.emacs is the saem type of forum. This is a reasonable assumption, even though it is incorrect. Therefore I suggest: 1. Put the announcement groups under gnu.announce, e.g. gnu.announce.emacs, gnu.announce.gcc. 2. If it is acceptable to have discussions in the *.bug groups (I'm still not sure), then I suggest removing the .bug trailer, i.e. gnu.emacs.bug becomes gnu.emacs, gnu.gcc.bug becomes gnu.gcc and so on. If discussions in the .bug groups are not acceptable, then leave the <thing>.bug groups alone, but allow discussions in the <thing> group. <thing> would be a freestanding newsgroup, unassociated with a mailing list. The result would be (if discssion is not allowed in .bug groups) gnu.announce.emacs <--> info-gnu-emacs gnu.emacs gnu.emacs.bug <--> bug-gnu-emacs etc. And (if discsion is allowed in .bug groups) gnu.announce.emacs <--> info-gnu-emacs gnu.emacs <--> bug-gnu-emacs etc.
mdb@ESD.3Com.COM (Mark D. Baushke) (11/17/89)
On 16 Nov 89 14:26:57 GMT, kjones@talos.uucp (Kyle Jones) said: Kyle> Therefore I suggest: Kyle> 1. Put the announcement groups under gnu.announce, e.g. Kyle> gnu.announce.emacs, gnu.announce.gcc. This is a good idea. Kyle> 2. If it is acceptable to have discussions in the *.bug groups (I'm Kyle> still not sure), then I suggest removing the .bug trailer, i.e. Kyle> gnu.emacs.bug becomes gnu.emacs, gnu.gcc.bug becomes gnu.gcc and so Kyle> on. Leave the .bug extension. It is more obvious that bug reports should be posted to such a group. Kyle> The result would be (if discssion is not allowed in .bug groups) Kyle> gnu.announce.emacs <--> info-gnu-emacs Kyle> gnu.emacs Kyle> gnu.emacs.bug <--> bug-gnu-emacs Kyle> etc. This sounds good to me. As an alternative to a group <thing>, there could be a <thing>.d group so that folks DON'T post bugs to <thing>. (Not that there is any way to really stop folks from posting to the incorrect group.) I would also favor the existence of a new 'sources' group for user contributed emacs source extensions (I would expect the majority to be lisp). This could also be the group to post the diff files for version upgrades. gnu.emacs.sources If an entire hierarchy for sources is preferred, maybe this would be better: gnu.sources.emacs gnu.sources.d gnu.sources.gcc etc. In any case, it would be VERY nice to have a single group that could be archived which has all of the contributed sources that are not a part of the official GNU distributions. Should groups which are not official mailing lists be only newsgroups or gatewayed to mailing lists? I would hope the answer is that they be both. -- Mark D. Baushke mdb@ESD.3Com.COM
news@bbn.COM (News system owner ID) (11/19/89)
kjones@talos.uu.net writes: < rms@AI.MIT.EDU writes: < > The principal purpose of info-gnu-emacs (a.k.a. gnu.emacs) is to < > convey announcements and polls on behalf of the GNU project to the < > users of GNU Emacs. < > [...] < > In other words, not for discussions and not for asking for help. < < I think the name gnu.emacs is very mislading to the typical USENET < reader. I know that gnu.* != USENET, but the difference is not readily < apparent to newcomers (slag? :-)). The typical reader sees comp.emacs, < and assumes gnu.emacs is the saem type of forum. This is a reasonable < assumption, even though it is incorrect. I agree also. I think that the fundimental problem with gnu.* is that because of the way it is set up, it looks to Useneters as a set of news groups that _happen_ to be relayed to mailing lists (for people who are stuck in the backwatters for reasons of home machine type or personal prefrence). In this case, it doesn't matter if people say over and over "Gnu isn't Usenet" -- if it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, flies like a duck, etc. then IT MUST BE A DUCK. Because of this, much like alt.*, gnu.* IS (de facto) part of Usenet. (This is one of those logical falacy but fact of life sort of things.) Further, because people _use_ gnu.emacs to ask for help and disscuss Gnu Emacs, there is obviously a need for this type of forum. The advantage to gnu.emacs for this is that one is sure that the topic is _Gnu_ Emacs (and hence Gnu Emacs Lisp), rather than Gosling (Unipress), CCA, Micro-, mg, MINCE, JOVE, ad nauseum. Therefore, if you want a mailing list relay, make it _obviously_ a mailing list relay: make it quasi-moderated (moderator = mailing list relay alias), and put mailing list noise at the beginning or end of the articles. Produce an object that looks like a hammer and someone will use it for a hammer... -- Paul Placeway <pplaceway@bbn.com>
montnaro@sprite.crd.ge.com (Skip Montanaro) (11/22/89)
In article <48457@bbn.COM> pplaceway@bbn.COM (Paul Placeway) writes:
Therefore, if you want a mailing list relay, make it _obviously_ a
mailing list relay: make it quasi-moderated (moderator = mailing list
relay alias), and put mailing list noise at the beginning or end of
the articles.
I've made just this suggestion a couple different times. Both times my
suggestion evaporated. I will try again.
Make the gnu.* newsgroups moderated. The "moderator's address" can be
nothing more than the appropriate mailing list. The mailing list output can
be injected into the correct gnu.* newsgroup, simply by adding an Approved:
header (I think). The latest versions of Usenet News automatically mail
postings to moderated groups to the "moderator". Will this be
oh-so-very-hard to implement? Sounds like a couple hours worth of work for
the right person with a little News background.
--
Skip Montanaro (montanaro@crdgw1.ge.com)