Re: Volume on -devel

[Tyson Dowd <trd@cs.mu.OZ.AU>]

On 18-Mar-1999, Richard Braakman <dark@xs4all.nl> wrote:
> 
> But more important than all that is the decision that Debian is a
> community you want to be part of.  That's not going to happen if you're
> kept out of discussions.

I agree.  

I support a move to make debian-devel for the discussion of development
of Debian (and thus should be largely, but not completely, posted to by
developers).  

A new list (or more than one) to discuss other topics that routinely 
pop up here is necessary.  Perhaps this kind of setup would help (with
some example topics drawn from current lists).

	debian-user
		Stays as is, user-level discussions focussed on the
		stable distributions (this group is pretty good
		as is, although some of the discussion could move to
		debian-discuss, and slink traffic needs to move to here
		now instead of using debian-devel).
		Example Topics:
			slink resc1440 disk does not work on 1GB memory machine 
			Sound Card problems
			Slink upgrade - problems with X.

	debian-unstable
		For discussions about the current unstable tree, broken
		packages, work arounds, co-ordination of fixes, etc.
		This is intended for user-developer interaction, it
		is the "debian-user" for beta-testers.
		debian-discuss)
		Example Topics:
			Potato, sendmail, glibc 2.1, and libdb2   
			Re: glibc 2.1 broke a couple of things.  
			Beta-testing and the glibc 2.1

	debian-devel
		For discussions of debian software developement,
		technical discussion.
		Intended for developers and embryonic developers to
		discuss real development issues, new packages, future
		directions, etc (unless this stuff is directly related
		to a particular stable or unstable distribution).
		Example Topics:
			 IMAP Cyrus     
			 POSIX standards   
			 Intent to package: "birthday" 
			 /usr/share  
			 new maintainer wanted for leafnode

	debian-discuss 
		For general discussion (a catchall group) of topics
		unrelated or only mildly related to actual debian software
		development.  
		Intended for users & developers to discuss more general
		topics (and probably move them to the appropriate forum
		if necessary).
		Example Topics:
			UK get-together
			The Apple Public Source License 
			Volume on -devel

Perhaps it would be worth splitting debian-discuss into a list for
developers to discuss things Debian issues, and a more general
discussion area for more general topics (e.g. a kind of
debian-slashdot).

But I think closing the lists is extreme -- by providing appropriate
forums we can encourage people to post to the right place, instead of
banning them from posting to the only place available.

-- 
The quantum sort: 
	while (!sorted) { do_nothing(); }
Tyson Dowd   <tyson@tyse.net>   http://tyse.net/