Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!lll-lcc!ames!mailrus!iuvax!dswise From: dswise@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu Newsgroups: news.admin Subject: Re: New advertising group -- I recommen Message-ID: <33800004@iuvax> Date: 5 Jan 89 17:52:00 GMT References: <6163@hoptoad.uucp> Organization: Indiana University CSCI, Bloomington Lines: 94 Nf-ID: #R:hoptoad.uucp:-616300:iuvax:33800004:000:5265 Nf-From: iuvax.cs.indiana.edu!dswise Jan 5 12:52:00 1989 Newsgroups: news.groups Subject: comp.lang.sigplan WINS Expires: November 20, 1988 References: Sender: dswise@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu (David S. Wise) Reply-To: dswise@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu (David S. Wise) Followup-To: Distribution: world Organization: Indiana University, Bloomington Keywords: ACM org libraries The results of the comp.lang.sigplan vote (12Oct88-10Nov88) are 233 YES and 52 NO. Thanks to all of you who voted! Most of the NO votes complained that the group was improperly named; vide infra. My count excludes responses to addresses other than to the requested sigplan@iuvax.cs.indiana.edu. Several messages mailed directly to me, or posted elsewhere, or that did not say YES or NO were not included. Informally they total 18 YES and 9 NO, but this count is vague. The official electorate is posted as followup to this note (per protocol). ****begin comment**** Allow me the following philosophical reaction to the vote. Usenet is a valuable resource, but---like many of our toys---computists won't manage it for very long, especially if we do not care for it and its readers. Organizing the "groups" is a non-trivial problem, because the classifications are useful only if they are descriptive, and if their growth is restrained. However, the problem is a familiar one; one can even get a degree in it. Usually the major is called something like "Library Science". Librarians are fine people, but we have strained their business by creating so much new knowledge so quickly. On the other hand, they like helping knowledge to grow, and follow what we do surprisingly well. Take yours to lunch soon. The groups classification is not perfect; indeed, I suggest a change, below. On the other hand, we must work within it. I proposed "comp.lang.sigplan" because it did *not* threaten to drag in thirty-one other SIGs and because it did *not* extend the "news.announce.conferences" abuse of the "news" root: "news" Groups concerned with the news network and software themselves. In short, I picked the classification to avoid problems, so to glean votes. SIGPLAN is fortunate; it's charter _is_ comp.lang.* (which is very active) so it has a right to be there---if only because new readers looking for SIGPLAN issues will think to look there. Furthermore, this vote indeed followed the rules for forming new groups--- even though there was no call-for-discussion. (SIGPLAN's 10,500 members trumps a lot of Email.) As we have just seen with the proposals for comp.sys.next , one might sometimes risk skipping all the unpleasant flaming. And as we learn while shopping for a car or in the election booth, "You can't always get what you want, but sometimes, you'll find, you get what you need." ****end comment**** The vote entitles us to the immediate creation of comp.lang.sigplan , but I want to use the impact of a lively vote (without on-net discussion) to petition the net gurus. In the original poll I observed: "Part of the problem seems to be that my SIGPLAN constituency does not generally read `news.groups', or other established group where this proposal might appear. That is, Usenet does not yet serve the constituency that I represent." That is why I electioneered in SIGPLAN Notices. The turnout and the recently successful comp.org.ieee vote seem to support my observation. Group titles like "comp.lang.*" are subject trees; libraries separate these from author indices, like "org.ieee.*". In the long run, I would prefer group names like "org.acm.sigplan" and "org.ieee.microwave" for the non-profit societies and their subgroups, as they become active on the net. The present "comp.org" is inappropriate because many readers would not naturally affiliate themselves with computer-focused societies. "comp" Topics of interest to both computer professionals and hobbyists, including topics in computer science, software source, and information on hardware and software systems. Similarly "sci.org" is inhospitable to engineers: "IEEE NEWS GROUP ... To accommodate the new news group in the present newsnet hierarchy, the ieee news group will be titled "comp.org.ieee" As all of us know, IEEE (and in general, EE & CS related activities have a scope much more broader than that of comp.org.xxxx groups) has more than 30 societies. In due course, a first level group ( similar to sci.xxxx ) may be started to accommodate all the engineering related news groups, so that the IEEE news group can find a permanent place there. ... K.R.S. Murthy" BY THE WAY, do join your professional society---whatever it may be! Reading net news is only the beginning of the lifelong professional contact and participation necessary to keep current. (And it has its tax benefits.) Therefore, I ask that "org" soon be anointed as a new root for moderated groups to be run by the various societies. So, form "comp.lang.sigplan" immediately and convert to "org.acm.sigplan" and to "org.ieee" ASAP. The moderator of comp.lang.sigplan is to be the Vice Chair of ACM's SIGPLAN. PS: I am willing to crosspost meeting information to news.announce.conferences :-| if someone can tell me how one moderated group crossposts to another.