From: Mark Hull-Richter Subject: Re: News Group Results To: sandmann AT clio DOT rice DOT edu (Charles Sandmann) Date: Mon, 27 Feb 1995 10:04:55 -0800 (PST) Cc: djgpp AT sun DOT soe DOT clarkson DOT edu, dj AT ctron DOT com In a recent emailgram, you (Charles Sandmann) wrote: > >Once again, this discussion is *NOT* appropriate for the list, so >send mail directly to this email address (sandmann AT clio DOT rice DOT edu) if >you have any strong opinions or brilliant ideas. Thanks. > Actually, IMNSHO, from what I have seen over the past month, about 50% of the discussions posted to this mailing list are not appropriate for it (e.g., MS-DOS, and most recently, GIF/JPEG questions that have little or nothing to do with C, GCC, DJGPP, etc., per se). In addition, the signal-to-noise ratio is extremely low, and I believe that the number of mailings is higher than 26 per day (although I haven't tracked it so I can't prove it, but it sure feels like it! :-). I know I'm probably going to get a lot of mail talking about how useful the list is, etc., etc., - this is useless because I'm not suggesting that the list is useless, just that it is overly noisy, so please use standard email etiquette and don't reply for at least 24 hours so you'll have time to think about the flame you're planning right now and decide with a cooler head (tomorrow) whether it's REALLY worth sending or not. Also, that way you get a chance to think over what I propose below. Now, I'm not normally the kind of person to bitch about something like this and just let it go - I have a proposal which would solve a) my irritation with the flood of email that this list generates and b) the problem with the S/N ratio. Here's what I propose: 1) If you ask a question to the list, be prepared to track all the answers you get and post a summary after a suitable period of time, say 24 hours (! :-). Be sure to include something that indicates whether the responses generated solutions or not (and if not, why not). 2) If you have an answer, send it DIRECTLY to the asker/poster and DO NOT REPEAT do NOT NOT NOT cc the mailing list. Trust that the asker will post the answer summary when they have a working solution (or have exhausted the suggested responses and need more). This would be considered just plain good netiquette in a formal newsgroup, and since this mailing list is not moderated, I think we should all exercise some self-moderation and try to avoid mass duplication of response. A classic example of this is the just-past spate of eight virtually identical answers to Jon Keene's question about kbhit() - would it not have been better for the eight responders to send their virtually identical responses to Jon and let _him_ post what he learned/gleaned from them? I think so. Thank you for your consideration "and your continuing support." -- ++== AT&T Mark A. Hull-Richter, Consulting Engineer (310)524-5782 voice +GIr== Global Teradata Decision Enabling Systems Center 427-5782 VoicePlus =++=== Information 100 North Sepulveda Boulevard, #17-259 (310)524-5517 FAX ==== Solutions El Segundo, CA 90245 mhr AT sparc DOT SanDiegoCA DOT ATTGIS DOT com