Fate of unix-pc.* (was Re: CALL FOR DISCUSSION: comp.sys.3b1)

[Karl Swartz]

In article <73513 at iuvax.cs.indiana.edu> templon at copper.ucs.indiana.edu (jeffrey templon) writes:
>I am aware of the argument that people will be forced to take a whole
>heirarchy (comp) in order to get comp.sys.3b1.  My best information
>says that this is not true

People often insist on arguing over things they know nothing about,
though I confess ignorance of there having been a debate over this
point.  Fortunately, your information is correct.

If you currently receive the unix-pc newsgroups on your machine,
your news feed (or feeds) has a "sys entry" (an entry in the file
/usr/lib/news/sys, generally) which resembles

    yourhost: ... ,unix-pc, ...

or possibly (and incorrectly)

    yourhost: ... ,unix-pc.all, ...

Assuming comp.{sys,sources}.3b1 is created, your feed could switch
to the following if you don't already receive comp.*

    yourhost: ... ,comp.sys.3b1,comp.sources.3b1, ...

or better yet

    yourhost: ... ,comp.all.3b1.all, ...

I prefer the latter as it covers both groups in one stroke plus any
future 3b1 groups that might appear.

>we should be able to heave our collective wisdom at the problem of
>taking only a select few groups as feed out of the whole mess.

I'm sure some people will still whine that it's unbearably difficult
to set up a feed of *just* UNIX PC groups, but such arguments are
based entirely on ignorance and/or laziness.  I think I've addressed
the first issue here, or at least provided the ammunition with which
to deal with it.  Alas, I don't have any ideas on how to deal with
the latter problem.  (Maybe a different news feed?)

>I have not addressed 'we need to CUT LOOSE unix-pc.*'.

I agree with your arguments against keeping unix-pc.* if the new
groups in comp.* are created.  However, it might still be of some
benefit to keep unix-pc around as a *distribution*, like world,
na, usa, and the like.  In fact, this point may explain the gaps
in connectivity of the unix-pc.net if use of 'unix-pc.all' in sys
entries is prevalent (as opposed to the corrent 'unix-pc').

>I believe that if we propose to keep unix-pc.general around for ANY
>REASON except as an alternate naming for comp.sys.3b1 ...

For the short term aliasing unix-pc.{general,bugs,uucp} over to
comp.sys.3b1 might be helpful, but long term this negates the
desire to escape the Unix-on-a-*86 crowd.  I would be inclined to
keep unix-pc.* for some grace period, then remove the groups but
add aliases to the comp.*.3b1 groups, then cut unix-pc.* loose
entirely (but perhaps keep unix-pc as a distribution).  Maybe a
month per phase?

-- 
Karl Swartz			 |UUCP	{uunet,decwrl}!daver!ditka!kls
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