From: utzoo!decvax!harpo!eagle!mhtsa!alice!npoiv!npois!houxm!houxa!houxi!deimos!orion!lime!we13!otuxa!ll1!ihldt!ihnp4!ixn5c!pcl
Newsgroups: net.news
Title: Re: Usenet area/org. targeting proposal
Article-I.D.: ixn5c.505
Posted: Tue Nov 16 15:18:03 1982
Received: Sat Nov 20 09:54:46 1982
References: machaids.151


I've been meaning to put this out on the net for a while, but a recent
article from 'Eric' (machaids!ekb) has finally prompted me to act.

The basis for Eric's suggestion is an observation that I made in this
newsgroup nearly a year ago, namely, that the "topic category"
(newsgroup) of an article is a quite separate piece of information from
what machines the article should be sent to.  Currently, the
distribution of an article is controlled by the first component of the
newsgroup's name, together with the 'sys' file entries for each machine.
Under the current software, individual newsgroups could be given
different distributions, but there is a universal convention that that
first component of the newsgroup name is all that is used to determine
distribution.

Now, the problem with having TWO pieces of information bundled into a
single newsgroup name, is that we would really like to have ALL POSSIBLE
COMBINATIONS of these two pieces of information (i.e. the cross product,
for you mathematical types).  That is, we should be able to submit an
article to some interest group (newsgroup), and INDEPENDENTLY indicate
what distribution that article should receive.  Under the current
scheme, we put both in the newsgroup name, and end up with, for example,
newsgroups 'general', 'ih.general', 'btl.general', 'bell.general',
and 'net.general'.  We also have 'ih.micro', 'btl.micro', and
'net.micro'.  The problem Eric cites in his message (needing the effect
of 'nj.sf-lovers' for announcing a local TV show) is another facet of
the same problem.

Proposed solution:  In brief, I think the best solution to the above is
to use a "To:" line to indicate the distribution (what a novel idea!),
and use the "Newsgroup:" to indicate JUST the topic category.  I will
expand on this in my next message, describing more generally how/why
news and mail should converge.

					Paul Lustgarten
					Bell Labs - Indian Hill
					ixn5c!pcl