Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site x.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!mit-eddie!cybvax0!frog!x!john
From: john@x.UUCP (John Woods)
Newsgroups: net.news,net.news.group
Subject: Re: net.bugs.0bsd?
Message-ID: <501@x.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 15-May-85 14:25:26 EDT
Article-I.D.: x.501
Posted: Wed May 15 14:25:26 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 17-May-85 04:52:48 EDT
References: <2698@nsc.UUCP>
Distribution: net
Organization: Charles River Data Systems, Framingham MA
Lines: 28
Xref: watmath net.news:3416 net.news.group:3125

> I've seen a LOT of silly and unneccessary newgroup messages recently,
> folks. You don't NEED to send a control message to the world if you are
> bringing your site up to snuff -- an editor (even ed!) and the mkdir
> command work great. Please, don't send control messages out onto the net
> unless you know what you are doing -- a minor slipup or typo (I know, good
> programmers never mistyppe) can create a fair amount of pain for the rest
> of the net -- something like 2000 sites worldwide now. 
> 
The problem is that the documentation for how to bring up news tell you to
do exactly the wrong thing:  you just run this magic shell script, which
generates an infinite number of newgrps!  Fortunately, when I installed news
here, I caught these messages and killed them before they went out.

Perhaps 2.10.3 could come with a more intelligent way of creating the news
heirarchy?  PULEEEZ???  Or perhaps control messages should be regarded as for
local consumption only without some particularly excruciating explicit action.

I've recently seen a number of postings and mail messages berating people for
doing just what they were told to do by the documentation, and indeed, quite
a reasonable-appearing thing to do if one is NOT ALREADY a netnews-wizard.
(Consider:  how many people bringing up netnews for the first time are going
to be skilled netnews-wizards?)

-- 
John Woods, Charles River Data Systems, Framingham MA, (617) 626-1101
...!decvax!frog!john, ...!mit-eddie!jfw, jfw%mit-ccc@MIT-XX.ARPA

"MU" said the Sacred Chao...