tchrist@convex.COM (Tom Christiansen) (03/08/91)
Perhaps the other rude posters to alt.sources of discussions, questions, et cetera ad nauseum, could be so considerate as John was and cancel their inappropriate postings? Perhaps I should post my rn macro that send autowhines at these folks so the whole net could send them ever-so-gentle reminders that they did the wrong thing. And I don't think the jargon file is source, either. --tom
clipper@no13sun.csd.uwo.ca (Khun Yee Fung) (03/09/91)
Maybe we should have a person to filter all the non-source messages in alt.sources to alt.sources.d. This person should not judge and thus delay the posting of sources but simply get rid of all the non-source messages. Is this possible for an established newsgroup? Khun Yee -- ---- Khun Yee Fung clipper@csd.uwo.ca (Internet) Alternative: 4054_3267@UWOVAX.BITNET Department of Computer Science Middlesex College The University of Western Ontario London, Ontario, N6A 5B7 CANADA
tchrist@convex.COM (Tom Christiansen) (03/09/91)
>Maybe we should have a person to filter all the non-source messages in >alt.sources to alt.sources.d. This person should not judge and thus >delay the posting of sources but simply get rid of all the non-source >messages. >Is this possible for an established newsgroup? Without a moderator? Only through cancels, which don't work well, and would get you talked about. Still, doesn't sound too horrible, but I don't think it would fly. --tom
news%wolves@cs.duke.edu (News Administrator @ Wolves) (03/09/91)
In <1991Mar08.144014.28853@convex.com> tchrist@convex.COM (Tom Christiansen) writes: >Perhaps the other rude posters to alt.sources of discussions, questions, >et cetera ad nauseum, could be so considerate as John was and cancel >their inappropriate postings? > >Perhaps I should post my rn macro that send autowhines at these folks >so the whole net could send them ever-so-gentle reminders that they >did the wrong thing. I haden't thought of making the thing an RN macro to do it, but for several weeks I have had one of the flunkies here going through alt.sources and send the offenders mail like this: >---------------------------------------------------- >Begin standard complaint text. > >You posted the above quoted article to the newsgroup alt.sources. > >It obviously is not a piece of source code. > >Please post requests to alt.sources.wanted > >Please post comments and discussion to alt.sources.d > >When following up articles, please correct the newsgroups line if >possible. > > >Angry replies to this message will be ignored. > > The News Administrator > @ wolves I don't see it as being to abrupt or overly impolite. Just short and to the point. The flunky, occasionally, sends a complaint form to something that I would not really consider complaining about. For example, patches and code with some discussion about alternatives might go unchallenged, and (for better or worse) something like the jargon file can get by - even if Eric SHOULD have sent it to Brian Kantor for posting on comp.doc. Most of the replies that do come in response to these little reminders are fairly polite and apologetic for the error and appreciating the pointers about where things should go and such. Occasionally, there are some high-strung recipients who get bent out of shape and complain to root about the "misbehaviour" of my news admin. There is even one net.author.from.some.trade.rag who seems to think that he is exempt from being spoken to for being a net.twit - and he keeps repeating the transgressions even though he makes noises elsewhere about being a good net user and apprentice guru. This person uses the ELM mailer bounce command to send the whole thing back to the postmaster here and thinks he's cute. My point to this is that here in the alt.sources area we need to do our own educating to keep the groups reasonable. Unlike the main Usenet, alt does not have the reasonable cohesiveness of the major site sysadmins and their kindred to assure compliance. alt.sources does not need a moderator, nor even the self-moderation of alt.hackers (despite the stupidity of the rutgers auto-approving gateway). It does need the support of every reader to complain to the violators, especially those who continue to do so after being warned at least once. -- Usenet Net News Administrator @ The Wolves Den news%wolves@cs.duke.edu news%wolves@mcnc.org ...duke!wolves!news There is a real person who watches this account as their assigned task!
jef@well.sf.ca.us (Jef Poskanzer) (03/11/91)
In the referenced message, news%wolves@cs.duke.edu (News Administrator @ Wolves) wrote: }alt.sources does not need a moderator, nor even the self-moderation of }alt.hackers (despite the stupidity of the rutgers auto-approving gateway). Ya know, what I came up with the idea of self-moderation, I was in fact thinking of alt.sources. I guess alt.hackers could be considered a testbed. How about it? What if alt.sources was moderated, with the moderators address pointing to an auto-replyer that sends back a little blurb? --- Jef Jef Poskanzer jef@well.sf.ca.us {apple, ucbvax, hplabs}!well!jef "No state shall make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts." -- the United States Constitution
rodney@tyrell.gtc.de (Rodney Volz) (03/11/91)
In article <1991Mar9.022240.27214@wolves.uucp> news%wolves@cs.duke.edu (News Administrator @ Wolves) writes: >In <1991Mar08.144014.28853@convex.com> >tchrist@convex.COM (Tom Christiansen) writes: >>Perhaps the other rude posters to alt.sources of discussions, questions, >>et cetera ad nauseum, could be so considerate as John was and cancel >>their inappropriate postings? >> >>Perhaps I should post my rn macro that send autowhines at these folks >>so the whole net could send them ever-so-gentle reminders that they >>did the wrong thing. How about RMGROUPing alt.sources and re-MKGROUPing it right away as a moderated newsgroup? I'd appreciate to have all source postet in the format common in comp.sources.unix. Would allow to archive sources automatically, as well. -Rod -- Rodney Volz - 7000 Stuttgart 1 - FRG ============> ...uunet!mcsun!unido!gtc!aragon!tyrell!rodney <============= rodney@tyrell.gtc.de * rodney@delos.stgt.sub.org * rodney@mcshh.hanse.de \_____________ May your children and mine live in peace. ______________/
kent@sparky.IMD.Sterling.COM (Kent Landfield) (03/12/91)
In article <7936@tyrell.gtc.de> rodney@tyrell.gtc.de (Rodney Volz) writes: > >How about RMGROUPing alt.sources and re-MKGROUPing it >right away as a moderated newsgroup? I'd appreciate to >have all source postet in the format common in comp.sources.unix. > >Would allow to archive sources automatically, as well. This would defeat the whole purpose of alt.sources. We already have a moderated sources group where the moderator's job is *just* to assure that the postings have the appropriate auxiliary headers and can unshar correctly. comp.sources.misc has better distribution than alt.sources and it is archived at known, major sites. The intent of alt.sources was to provide a place where people could just pipe sources to inews if the fit overtook them. :-) It has also become a place where people send software to be beta tested. When the author is satisified that the bug reports have died down, they can submit their software to c.s.misc for archiving having let the community do their final testing. The original charter of comp.sources.misc called for moderation solely to reject non-source postings, nothing more; the intent was to provide net.sources without the noise. The advantages of posting to c.s.m are that archiving is almost as widespread as that of comp.sources.unix, that anything that is source code can be posted, and that it's guaranteed not to be lost in non-source, discussion postings. The disadvantages are that there is a minor delay caused by having to filter stuff through the moderator. Currently, that delay is less than 48 hours and in most cases goes out the day I receive it. I will make this offer again, there is an open invitation to all who are willing to share their creations with the rest of us. As c.s.m moderator, I will do my very best to get submissions out to the community as fast as possible. Development and testing are your responsibility, posting and archiving are mine. :-) -Kent+ -- Kent Landfield INTERNET: kent@sparky.IMD.Sterling.COM Sterling Software, IMD UUCP: uunet!sparky!kent Phone: (402) 291-8300 FAX: (402) 291-4362 Please send comp.sources.misc-related mail to kent@uunet.uu.net.
ronald@robobar.co.uk (Ronald S H Khoo) (03/18/91)
Jef Poskanzer <jef@well.sf.ca.us> writes: > How about it? What if alt.sources was moderated, with the moderators > address pointing to an auto-replyer that sends back a little blurb? In order to prevent the rash of complaints similar to those we've had in alt.hackers, you'd need an *additional* fallback address which is documented in the blurb. Just because current Unix systems let you forge approval doesn't mean that all news systems will necessarily continue to do so, and some public access systems (like one I used to run :-( ) don't give the user adequate access. The fallbnack address could either be an auto approval gateway that checks for source (e.g. to make sure the Subject: like has no Re: and that the source text contains the string "THIS IS SOURCE, DAMMIT" or something like that.) or, if you don't trust this approach, to provide a real human volunteer moderator. Yes, this means that those who can't forge get a delay. I think this is a reasonable compromise. But I'm not volunteering to be the moderator. Mail to the UKNet is far too expensive. -- Ronald Khoo <ronald@robobar.co.uk> +44 81 991 1142 (O) +44 71 229 7741 (H)
jef@well.sf.ca.us (Jef Poskanzer) (03/19/91)
In the referenced message, ronald@robobar.co.uk (Ronald S H Khoo) wrote: }In order to prevent the rash of complaints similar to those we've }had in alt.hackers, you'd need an *additional* fallback address }which is documented in the blurb. Just because current Unix systems let you }forge approval doesn't mean that all news systems will necessarily continue }to do so, and some public access systems (like one I used to run :-( ) }don't give the user adequate access. Well, there are lots and lots of ways to get an article into a moderated newsgroup, but what's appropriate for alt.hackers isn't appropriate for alt.sources. T. William Wells sent me email along these lines too. He suggested that the moderator's address point to a program that says something like this: Thank you for posting to alt.sources. This newsgroup is for posting source code only but there is no one checking to see that what is posted is really source. Since not everyone knows that only source code should be posted here, I, the alt.sources moderator-daemon, have been programmed to occasionally remind the posters to this newsgroup that they should only post source. I've recorded who you are and won't be bothering you again for at least one month. If you'd like to shut me up completely, send me a message at alt-sources-daemon@wherever.com saying "ignore user@dom.ain" and I will never send a message to that address again. Again, thank you for posting, and happy coding! The wording could use a little tweaking, for instance to make it clearer that the article *has* been posted, but I think the basic idea is great. Bill also pointed out that the auto-posting daemon could make sure the followup-to line is pointing to alt.sources.d, or at least away from alt.sources. I would add verbiage inviting people to self-moderate if they want to avoid the (minimal) delay and (unknown) fragility of the daemon. This plus a weekly informational posting would, I think, solve the alt.sources problem once and for all. --- Jef Jef Poskanzer jef@well.sf.ca.us {apple, ucbvax, hplabs}!well!jef "When the well's dry, we know the worth of water." -- Ben Franklin
karl@ficc.ferranti.com (Karl Lehenbauer) (03/20/91)
Six new messages in alt.sources today, and all six were non-source postings... a record. Worst was the "I changed distribution back to alt.sources because the correct TRS-80 minimal basic program is '1!'" Sheesh! -- -- "If it ain't too broke, don't fix it." -- me, with apologies to Bert Lantz Save Twin Peaks!!
emv@ox.com (Ed Vielmetti) (03/20/91)
In article <LV3A2.5@ny1.ferranti.com> karl@ficc.ferranti.com (Karl Lehenbauer) writes:
Six new messages in alt.sources today, and all six were non-source postings...
a record. Worst was the "I changed distribution back to alt.sources because
the correct TRS-80 minimal basic program is '1!'" Sheesh!
but comp.sources.unix is alive again, so the net amount of sources is
still quite high.
--
Msen Edward Vielmetti
/|--- moderator, comp.archives
emv@msen.comskrenta@amix.commodore.com (Rich Skrenta) (03/20/91)
alt.source does seem to have become a swamp of "Please send me FOO" requests.
jef@well.sf.ca.us (Jef Poskanzer) writes:
[nifty moderator-daemon message]
I really like the message. You don't need to moderate alt.sources to
use it, however. Just set it up now on your machine and have it watch
/usr/spool/news/alt/sources. The "shut me up completely" by mailing
to the daemon can still work, too.
Rich
--
skrenta@amix.commodore.comxanthian@zorch.SF-Bay.ORG (Kent Paul Dolan) (03/20/91)
Jef, If you have a human in a diversion loop for the automoderator, it would be nice to enforce the existance in the article of the Archive-Name entry; the biggest negative of alt.sources is not the stray non-source postings, but the difficulty of organizing the archives without some namespace control. Credit this idea to Peter da Silva. It might also be nice if there were a way to ping the root/postmaster/usenet address at the site of origin exactly once to remind the sysadmin that group alt.sources.d should be carried wherever alt.sources is. With no data, I can only envisage that part of the misplaced discussion traffic is originating at sites with no subscription to the discussion subgroup. Kent, the man from xanth. <xanthian@Zorch.SF-Bay.ORG> <xanthian@well.sf.ca.us>
darcy@druid.uucp (D'Arcy J.M. Cain) (03/20/91)
In article <23674@well.sf.ca.us> Jef Poskanzer <jef@well.sf.ca.us> writes:
[ daemon moderation stuff deleted ]
Any reason why this requires a moderated newsgroup? Why not just set up
the daemon to monitor the current newsgroup? That way there is no need
to change the group and some site admin with SFB can't decide to get around
the moderation by setting up their own system. The only difference that
I see is that the follow-up can't be automatically changed but that really
isn't the biggest problem in the group now.
--
D'Arcy J.M. Cain (darcy@druid) |
D'Arcy Cain Consulting | There's no government
Toronto, Ontario, Canada | like no government!
+1 416 424 2871 |jef@well.sf.ca.us (Jef Poskanzer) (03/22/91)
In the referenced message, darcy@druid.uucp (D'Arcy J.M. Cain) wrote: }Any reason why this requires a moderated newsgroup? Why not just set up }the daemon to monitor the current newsgroup? That way there is no need }to change the group and some site admin with SFB can't decide to get around }the moderation by setting up their own system. The only difference that }I see is that the follow-up can't be automatically changed but that really }isn't the biggest problem in the group now. Right. Rich Skrenta pointed this out too. I suppose the daemon could take a "Followup-To: alt.sources.d" as evidence that the poster didn't need a reminder. Lest anyone claim this is just the same old form-letter-flame system we have now, the significant difference is that there would be precisely one site doing this. --- Jef Jef Poskanzer jef@well.sf.ca.us {apple, ucbvax, hplabs}!well!jef WARNING: PROPER USE REQUIRES EXPERT INSTRUCTION
tchrist@convex.COM (Tom Christiansen) (03/22/91)
From the keyboard of Jef Poskanzer <jef@well.sf.ca.us>: :Lest anyone claim this is just the same old form-letter-flame system :we have now, the significant difference is that there would be precisely :one site doing this. Well, perhaps, but as it is now, they sure get the message. :-) And it's NOT a flame -- it's a reminder service. --tom