Xref: utzoo news.groups:4145 comp.sys.cbm:1437
Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!rutgers!iuvax!pur-ee!j.cc.purdue.edu!ray
From: ray@j.cc.purdue.edu (Ray Moody)
Newsgroups: news.groups,comp.sys.cbm
Subject: The proposal for comp.binaries.cbm and comp.sources.cbm
Message-ID: <7169@j.cc.purdue.edu>
Date: 31 May 88 04:43:53 GMT
Reply-To: ray@j.cc.purdue.edu (Ray Moody)
Organization: Purdue University
Lines: 59


    Well, it has been two weeks since the formal comp.binaries.cbm and
comp.sources.cbm proposal.  The discussion has ended and voting has
begun.

    Votes should be mailed to me.  Please don't post your vote -- it
won't be counted.  Currently, I can be reached at these addresses:

		ray@j.cc.purdue.edu
		pur-ee.UUCP!j.cc.purdue.edu!ray
		purdue.UUCP!j.cc.purdue.edu!ray
		moody@purccvm.BITNET

    I will acknowledge all votes.  If you don't get an acknowledgement, then I
didn't get your vote.

    If I can get 100 more yes votes than no votes in the next 30 days, then I
will post a summary of the votes to news.groups and proceed with the proper
procedures for newsgroup creation.  If I can't get enough votes, ... well,
that will be the end of comp.binaries.cbm.  A mailing list of alt-newsgroup
will be considered.

    A number of votes were sent during the discussion period (and therefore
before voting officially started).  I plan to count these votes unless the
backbone tells me that I shouldn't.  The way I figure, these people can send
me mail in the unlikely event that they wish to change their minds.

    There were many things discussed during the discussion period.  Many
people disapprove of binary postings in general.  They believe that, at least
for C programs, binary files are substantially larger than source files.  This
is certainly true for C programs, but most Commodore programs are written in
assembly.  The source for such a program can easily be 15 times the size of
the resulting binary.

    Some Commodore users felt that adequate forums already existed for the
exchange of Commodore CPM programs.  Because of this, I am going to adjust my
proposal slightly.  Comp.binaries.cbm and comp.sources.cbm will be for the
exchange of software for all 8-bit commodore machines, except for CPM
software.

    Some people have suggested that Commodore software be posted to
comp.sources.misc or to comp.sys.cbm.  I doubt that the comp.sources.misc
moderator would accept a half-meg posting that would only run on a C64 when
a 30K binary would do.  (I could be wrong about this, but as I recall, the
comp.sources.misc moderator once turned down a posting just because it was for
the Commodore computer...  Somebody correct me if I am wrong).  The posting of
programs to comp.sys.cbm has always been discouraged in the past.  I can't
understand why everybody is changing their minds so suddenly :=).

    Somebody else suggested that binary groups be given a hierarchy of their
own.  I really don't care about this.  I only ask that the creation of
comp.binaries.cbm not be delayed until this issue is resolved.  It can be
moved just as easily as the other binary groups.

    I do have one question, however.  If the binary groups are given their own
hierarchy, what (if anything....) will happen to the corresponding source
groups?

								Ray