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Internet Message Format | 1994-01-19 | 11.5 KB

Path: bloom-beacon.mit.edu!nic.hookup.net!swrinde!emory!news-feed-2.peachnet.edu!concert!bigblue.oit.unc.edu!sunSITE!mdw From: mdw@sunsite.unc.edu (Matt Welsh) Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.announce,comp.os.linux.help,comp.os.linux.development,comp.os.linux.admin,comp.os.linux.misc,comp.os.linux,news.answers,comp.answers Subject: Welcome to the comp.os.linux.* hierarchy! Followup-To: poster Date: 19 Jan 1994 07:53:19 GMT Organization: The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Lines: 240 Approved: linux-announce@tc.cornell.edu (Matt Welsh) Distribution: world Message-ID: <2hiotf$eiq@bigblue.oit.unc.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: sunsite.unc.edu Keywords: intro, USENET, Linux newsgroups Originator: mdw@sunSITE Xref: bloom-beacon.mit.edu comp.os.linux.announce:1715 comp.os.linux.help:17553 comp.os.linux.development:4931 comp.os.linux.admin:3568 comp.os.linux.misc:7958 news.answers:14317 comp.answers:3497 Archive-name: linux/announce/intro Last-modified: 18 January 94 [] Welcome to the comp.os.linux.* hierarchy! Background ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This posting is an introduction to the comp.os.linux.* hierarchy of USENET newsgroups. Linux is a free implementation of UNIX for 80386/80486 machines covered by the GNU GPL. Most of the development of the Linux kernel has been done by Linus Torvalds, an internationally reknowned UNIX wizard from Helsinki, Finland. For the past two years or so, the newsgroup comp.os.linux grew to be one of the most popular groups on USENET. Late in 1992, a CFV for splitting comp.os.linux was posted; the only group which passed was comp.os.linux.announce, a moderated newsgroup for Linux announcements and patches. Six months later, during the summer of 1993, another CFV for splitting comp.os.linux was posted. The voting period for the comp.os.linux reorganization results ended on 4 August 1993. The results were as follows: comp.os.linux reorganization results - 1842 votes Yes No : 2/3? >100? : Pass? : Group ---- ---- : ---- ----- : ----- : ------------------------------- 1692 135 : Yes Yes : Yes : comp.os.linux.admin 1741 90 : Yes Yes : Yes : comp.os.linux.development 1647 177 : Yes Yes : Yes : comp.os.linux.help 1660 155 : Yes Yes : Yes : comp.os.linux.misc Because of this split, the newsgroup comp.os.linux was deleted on 11 November 1993. The new newsgroups were created on 11 August 1993. This posting describes these newsgroups, including comp.os.linux.announce, which remains entact. There should be no more traffic to the now-defunct group comp.os.linux; please use one of the new groups instead. General Policy ------------------------------------------------------------------------- The general policy for the Linux newsgroups is simple. Who sets the policy? We all do. All of us on USENET are interested in communicating openly about a number of topics. That's why we have USENET. If you want the Linux newsgroups to work for you, a few suggestions: * Read the Linux FAQ and follow the newsgroups for some time before posting questions. This is very important. comp.os.linux suffered from HUGE amounts of noise and traffic because much of the growing readership never bothered to READ the newsgroup; they only posted questions. The same thing will happen with the new newsgroups unless you read the FAQ (found on sunsite.unc.edu in the file pub/Linux/docs/FAQ) and read the newsgroup for some time before posting questions. Chances are, your question has already been recently answered, and a simple browsing of the newsgroup will answer it. We suggest using a threaded newsreader such as "trn" which will allow you to browse and mark articles by subject, so you don't have to read each and every article in each newsgroup. Also of interest are the Linux HOWTO documents, found on sunsite.unc.edu in pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO. They describe many features of the Linux system. * Crossposting between the Linux newsgroups is STRONGLY discouraged. If you do crosspost questions between Linux newsgroups, expect to be flamed to oblivion. The reason we have a newsgroup split is to categorize discussions into separate newsgroups. Crossposting negates this effect. If your posting cannot fit into ONE of the newsgroups c.o.l.admin, c.o.l.help, or c.o.l.development, then you should post it to c.o.l.misc. The one exception is for announcements. Occasionally, an important announcement (such as this one) will be crossposted between c.o.l.announce and one or more of the other c.o.l.* groups. These announcements must be approved by the .announce moderator; see below. * Reply to questions via e-mail if at all possible. While discussion in the newsgroups is encouraged, if someone is asking a simple question to which the answer is well-known, there is no reason to post the reply. Don't assume that the person posting the question actually reads the newsgroup or will even note your followup if they do. Reply via e-mail unless the reply is of general interest. * Don't flame newbies. Over the course of the past few months, the Linux community has developed an oversensitive ego and a reputation for being unfriendly towards newcomers, mostly because of unwarranted flaming by a handful of righteous individuals. If someone posts, saying, "Hi! I'm new to this group! What is Linux?" (which will inevitably happen as the new newsgroups are propagated), DO NOT FLAME THEM. When someone sees a new newsgroup pop up within "rn", they are justifiably curious about the new group and probably don't know that well over 80,000 people who know EVERYTHING about Linux read the group. Right? Instead of being rude, you can send a polite note to the poster, saying, "Hello, Linux is a free implementation of UNIX for the 386 and 486. You can get the FAQ from sunsite.unc.edu in /pub/Linux/docs. Let me know if I can be of help!". That's all. Not difficult, eh? You can even save your stock reply in a file and simply send form-letters to newbies if you wish. But there is very little point in flaming or ever being rude. It goes against everything that Linux can and should be. Just remember that nobody knows everything---not even Linus--- and that you were a newbie once, too. :) comp.os.linux.announce ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Comp.os.linux.announce is a moderated newsgroup for Linux announcements and source patches. The purpose of this group was to get all of the ``important'' Linux information out of the regular newsgroup and into a place where all Linux users could see the important announcements without having to wade through a jungle of other postings. So far, this group has been very successful. The moderators for this group are myself (Matt Welsh, mdw@sunsite.unc.edu) and Lars Wirzenius (wirzeniu@cc.helsinki.fi). We will be sharing the moderator duty, and backing each other up to make sure that postings to this group will be approved as soon as possible after they're submitted. Submissions to this group should be mailed to the address: linux-announce@tc.cornell.edu If you have any problems or questions about c.o.l.announce, please send mail to the moderators at linux-announce-request@tc.cornell.edu Or simply mail us directly. This is not a request address for mailing list subscription; see below. A separate posting details the guidelines for submitting to this group. I plan to approve just about anything that's posted to this group, except for questions or discussions about Linux. So, please, post away. :) There are also archives of comp.os.linux.announce available at a number of Linux FTP sites: check sunsite.unc.edu:/pub/Linux/docs/linux-announce.archive There is a mailing list mirror of the comp.os.linux.announce newsgroup; to join, send mail to linux-activists-request@niksula.hut.fi With the line X-Mn-Admin: join ANNOUNCE at the top of the body (not in the subject). Approved postings to c.o.l.announce will automatically be mailed to this mailing list channel. comp.os.linux.admin ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This newsgroup was created simply to thwart the unique newsgroup acronym "c.o.l.a", previously used by c.o.l.announce. However, this newsgroup is also used for discussions and questions about running Linux systems, either in a single-user or multi-user environment. Clearly, there is no large distinction between c.o.l.admin and c.o.l.help. However, .admin should be mostly used for discussions about RUNNING Linux, not USING or PROGRAMMING it. Unfortunately, especially with Linux, the line between system administrator and system user is very fuzzy. In short, we anticipate c.o.l.admin to be mostly about questions with installing, setting up, and configuring Linux systems, as well as other discussions relating to system administration. comp.os.linux.development ------------------------------------------------------------------------- c.o.l.development, or "c.o.l.d" for short, is a newsgroup for questions and discussions about Linux kernel and systems-level development. Please note that this is a newsgroup about development OF Linux, not development FOR Linux. In other words, c.o.l.d isn't for questions about programming or porting software to Linux. Instead, this is a newsgroup for discussions about developing the Linux kernel itself, including writing device drivers, adding new features, and so on. In addition, discussions about development of shared libraries, and other essential systems-level projects, are welcome here. Hopefully, this newsgroup will embody some of the content and scope of the linux-activists mailing list channels such as GCC, KERNEL, SCSI, and NET. comp.os.linux.help ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Comp.os.linux.help is perhaps the most general of Linux newsgroups. It is for any general user, programming, or setup questions and discussion about Linux. If your question is about Linux development, post to c.o.l.development. If it is about system administration, post to c.o.l.admin. However, if your question is of a more general nature, such as "How do I set up Linux for use with an NE2000 card?", c.o.l.help is your place. Remember that you should not crosspost between .help and other Linux newsgroups. This means that if you are asking for help in .development, that's fine, but .help is for those questions which don't fit into .admin and .development. comp.os.linux.misc ------------------------------------------------------------------------- This group is the canonical ``catch-all'' for discussions and questions which don't fit into the other Linux newsgroups. While c.o.l.help is generally for questions, c.o.l.misc is for discussions of a general nature about Linux, such as setting up a file hierarchy standard, questions about Linus' personal life and virtual beer, and the inevitable flame war. Again, it should be noted that crossposting between c.o.l.misc and other Linux newsgroups is strongly discouraged. If your posting or question does not fit into ONLY ONE of the other Linux newsgroups, post it to .misc. Comments ------------------------------------------------------------------------- If you have questions or comments about this document, please direct them to mdw@sunsite.unc.edu. Flames to /dev/null; cheques and money orders to Linus Torvalds. Thanks.