DRAFT FAQ: Guidelines on Usenet Newsgroup Names
David.W...@bnr.co.uk
Archive-name: usenet/creating-newsgroups/naming/part1
Last-change: 28 Nov 1994 by David.W...@bnr.co.uk
Changes-posted-to: news.misc
[This is a draft FAQ, proposed for inclusion in news.announce.newusers.
It has not yet been sent to news.answers for approval, so the Archive-name
above is just a proposal. After a few rounds of posting this as a draft,
it'll be added to news.answers. Corrections or improvements to the FAQ
should be sent to the author; please Cc: me on comments about the
appropriateness of the newsgroups that this is posted to. --
netan...@deshaw.com]
Guidelines on Usenet Newsgroup Names
"To-day we have naming of parts."
This document is intended to be a primer for use by those involved in
creating new Usenet news groups, namely in the comp, sci, soc, rec, news,
misc and talk groups. The same principles may be used with other
hierarchies, but those are beyond the scope of this document.
Usenet news group names are structured, hierarchic, taxonomic but not
definitive. They are intended to help users find what they want and news
administrators manage their systems, to the benefit of their users.
By understanding each of these concepts, you can understand how to
select suitable names for new news groups.
Structured
News group names are structured into parts separated by dots, for
example "rec.pets.dogs". Each part may be up to 14 characters long,
and should consist only of letters, digits and "-", with at least
one letter.
Hierarchic
Names fall into clear hierarchies - for example all computer-related
groups are in comp. Each may be sub-divided into second, third, and
lower level hierarchies, such as sci.physics and comp.sys.sun, by
adding more parts to the basic name. The first part is the most
general (sci or comp), the second more specific, and so on. The
last part completes the actual group name. As each part implies a
further level, words at the same level are included into one part
using a hyphen - e.g. misc.invest.real-estate rather than
misc.invest.estate.real, which would imply that a real was a type
of estate!
Taxonomic
Taxonomy is the science of the classifying things - for example
species in biology, or books in a library. Group names classify
subjects into areas and hierarchies. Getting these right is not
easy, for you have to fit in with those already there, and also
allow for likely future growth.
Not definitive
News group names are inclusive rather than definitive. That is to
say, a group name defines an area in which a message may be posted
if there is no other group with a better name fit. The name does
not define exact limits to the group, eliminating subjects that do
not exactly match the definition.
Helping users
The group name is often the only clue the user has about the group
without reading a selection of articles from the group. There are
currently over 1300 Usenet news groups, and well over 10,000 groups
including all the other news hierarchies from alt to zer. It is
not possible for users to read every group to find out which are of
interest to them. Similarly, even a very popular group will only
be read by 1% of all Usenet users. So the name has to make sense to
the 99% who are not reading the group. It should be clear enough
to avoid users posting "what is this?" articles, and to ensure that
those who *would* like to know more about the subject do recognise
the group's purpose and start to read it and join in. Also, bear in
mind that Usenet is global, that users come from many different
cultures, and that for many, English is not their first language.
This leads to some strong guidelines about choosing names:
- Group similar subjects together, in the same hierarchy if
possible, so that people looking for a related subject will have a
good idea where to find it. It is often better to put a new group
with others in an approximately right "place" than to insist on
getting the name precise at the expense of putting the group in
some obscure area that many potential users will not look at.
- Create general groups before creating very specific ones.
- Dnt Abrv8 Do not abbreviate or use obscure names. Your
abbreviation may well be recognised by someone else as meaning
something entirely different, especially if English is a second
language to them.
- Use English words in group names. The articles in a group should
use whatever language is appropriate for that group, but group names
should use English as that is the one language that can be
understood by almost all Usenet users.
Helping news administrators
No site now has the disk space to carry 10,000 news groups and keep
all their articles for weeks. So news administrators have to be
selective in which groups they carry and how long they keep the
articles of each group (expiry times). Yet with so many groups,
they cannot manage each one separately. So they make use of
the hierarchic property, and control news in hierarchies. For
example, one may keep comp articles longer than rec, another may
decide not to take any comp.sys.ibm.* groups as none of their users
reads them. This is the other reason hierarchies are so important,
and why a new group should always be fitted into an existing
hierarchy if at all possible. Some new group proposers think it
does not matter if their group does not fit in to this scheme,
assuming that news administrators who don't want it can select it
out individually: this is a mistaken view. Every group that a site
gets that its users do not read, makes less disk space and so
shorter expiry times for the groups they *do* want.
What's next?
Think about these guidelines before naming your new news group.
Remember that name mistakes made in the past when Usenet was much
smaller, or now in uncontrolled parts of the net like alt, are no
reason to make more mistakes now. On the contrary, now is the time
to correct some of those past mistakes.
And if you still need advice, ask group-...@uunet.uu.net.
Topher Eliot
>Structured
> News group names are structured into parts separated by dots, for
> example "rec.pets.dogs". Each part may be up to 14 characters long,
> and should consist only of letters, digits and "-", with at least
> one letter.
Currently, there is a group that contains the symbol "+". Are you now saying
that that group is, or will be, illegally named under these "guidelines"?
I direct your attention to rec.antiques.radio+phono which discusses two topics
closely tied together radios _and_ phonos.
John Pimentel
In fact, I see:
alt.creative+cooking
rec.antiques.radio+phono
comp.lang.c++
dg.ml.x.xc++
gnu.g++
gnu.g++.announce
gnu.g++.bug
gnu.g++.help
gnu.g++.lib.bug
comp.std.c++
Now these are just what I see in my .newsrc, so maybe they're way out
of date, but there they are. And I'm considering proposing
misc.consumers.house.howtobuy+sell.
Topher Eliot Data General Unix Core Development
(919) 248-6371 el...@dg-rtp.dg.com
Obviously, I speak for myself, not for DG.
misc.consumers.house archivist. Send mail to house-...@dg-rtp.dg.com
Day care: stale liberal idea. Orphanages: innovative conservative idea.
John Pimentel
In article <D4pD0...@deshaw.com> David.W...@bnr.co.uk writes:
>Original-author: David.W...@bnr.co.uk
>Archive-name: usenet/creating-newsgroups/naming/part1
>Last-change: 28 Nov 1994 by David.W...@bnr.co.uk
>Changes-posted-to: news.misc
>Structured
> News group names are structured into parts separated by dots, for
> example "rec.pets.dogs". Each part may be up to 14 characters long,
> and should consist only of letters, digits and "-", with at least
> one letter.
Currently, there is a group that contains the symbol "+". Are you now saying
Richard & Marsha
>>Structured
>> News group names are structured into parts separated by dots,
for
>> example "rec.pets.dogs". Each part may be up to 14 characters
long,
>> and should consist only of letters, digits and "-", with at
least
>> one letter.
>
>Currently, there is a group that contains the symbol "+". Are you now
saying
>that that group is, or will be, illegally named under these
"guidelines"?
>I direct your attention to rec.antiques.radio+phono which discusses two
topics
>closely tied together radios _and_ phonos.
>
>John Pimentel
>
and as Mr. Primentl points out the addition of the "+" is a valid
perspective for consideration as an additive to the Draft.
Richard Stanton
Alan Brown
Topher Eliot <el...@dg-rtp.dg.com> wrote:
> Currently, there is a group that contains the symbol "+". Are you now saying
> that that group is, or will be, illegally named under these "guidelines"?
> I direct your attention to rec.antiques.radio+phono which discusses two topics
> closely tied together radios _and_ phonos.
>
>alt.creative+cooking
>rec.antiques.radio+phono
>comp.lang.c++
>dg.ml.x.xc++
>gnu.g++
>gnu.g++.announce
>gnu.g++.bug
>gnu.g++.help
>gnu.g++.lib.bug
>comp.std.c++
These are all a pain in the ass for people running MS-DOG based news
servers as the + character is illegal in directory names, necessitating
manual intervention in the active file for such groups...
--
AB
John Pimentel
Manual intervention is required in cases where the newsgroup name is longer
than 8 characters (11 if you add the extension) and considering that the
current limit is 14 chararcters. The "+" would the least of MS-DOS based
news servers.
Russ Allbery
>
>These are all a pain in the ass for people running MS-DOG based news
>servers as the + character is illegal in directory names, necessitating
>manual intervention in the active file for such groups...
I do not think supporting MS-DOS based news servers should be a
consideration in Usenet group naming policy.
(Yes! I always wanted to be able to say that! :) )
--
Russ Allbery (r...@cs.stanford.edu) http://www-leland.stanford.edu/~rra/
Kaleb KEITHLEY
Alan Brown <al...@papaioea.manawatu.planet.co.nz> writes:
>
>These are all a pain in the ass for people running MS-DOG based news
>servers as the + character is illegal in directory names, necessitating
>manual intervention in the active file for such groups...
If that were true it might be a consideration. In fact it's only the
braindead MS-DOS shell, COMMAND.COM that can't handle '+' in a pathname.
I don't think the whole world should be limited by what COMMAND.COM
can or cannot do. There are plenty of alternatives, don't settle for
using junk software just because it's the greatest common denominator.
Choose better.
--
Kaleb KEITHLEY
Alan Brown
<pime...@roots.ultranet.com> wrote: >In article
<3j4mkm$4...@papaioea.manawatu.planet.co.nz>
al...@papaioea.manawatu.planet.co.nz (Alan Brown) writes: > >>In article
<ELIOT.95M...@basgazuni.dg.com>, >>Topher Eliot
>>>gnu.g++.bug >>>gnu.g++.help >>>gnu.g++.lib.bug >>>comp.std.c++ >
>>These are all a pain in the ass for people running MS-DOG based news
>>servers as the + character is illegal in directory names, necessitating
>>manual intervention in the active file for such groups... > >Manual
intervention is required in cases where the newsgroup name is longer >than
8 characters (11 if you add the extension) and considering that the
>current limit is 14 chararcters. The "+" would the least of MS-DOS based
>news servers.
It's quite esy to truncate a line to 8 characters. Most modern news
system running on unixen limited to 14 chars do it too.
It's a lot harder to intervene into the directory creation process and
establish an alternative group name, especially when the established DOS
news software, which has been around for several years demands that sort
of action.
--
AB
Michael Shields
Nathan Mehl <nat...@bwh.harvard.edu> wrote:
> Anyhow, I agree. MS-DOS also does not implement symbolic links
> (aka aliases, shadows), which makes it an unsuitable environment
> for operating a server from the get-go.
The easiest solution here is to store magic files like
LINKTO \var\spool\news\news\admin\misc\666
and manually dereference them.
Not that I advocate using MS-DOS, or any Microsoft product, of course!
--
Shields.
Nathan Mehl
: Alan Brown <al...@papaioea.manawatu.planet.co.nz> writes:
: >
: >These are all a pain in the ass for people running MS-DOG based news
: >servers as the + character is illegal in directory names, necessitating
: >manual intervention in the active file for such groups...
: I do not think supporting MS-DOS based news servers should be a
: consideration in Usenet group naming policy.
: (Yes! I always wanted to be able to say that! :) )
Heh.
But...msdos-based news SERVERS? Do such beasts actually exist?
How on earth could a full server be crammed into a 640K address
space? Or is this just something that spools articles locally
without forwarding them on...?
Anyhow, I agree. MS-DOS also does not implement symbolic links
(aka aliases, shadows), which makes it an unsuitable environment
for operating a server from the get-go.
--
---------{http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/nmehl/home.html}-------------
| Is it you / is it me / search for things that you can't see / |
| going blind / out of reach / somewhere in the vaseline. |
----{Nathan J. Mehl}-------------{nat...@bwh.harvard.edu}--------
Mike Chapman
Alan Brown <al...@papaioea.manawatu.planet.co.nz> wrote:
>It's quite esy to truncate a line to 8 characters. Most modern news
>system running on unixen limited to 14 chars do it too.
Easy, but are there any cases where that would cause duplication?
>It's a lot harder to intervene into the directory creation process and
>establish an alternative group name, especially when the established DOS
>news software, which has been around for several years demands that sort
>of action.
Perhaps those people should explore finding a real operating system
so we don't have to break Usenet. How long do you think DOS
is going to be in use anyway? Sorry, a plus is something I
expect to use in names - what would have us instead, ampersands?
At least on the Unix machines even though the shell would like
to give meaning to ampersands the OS so broken as to prevent
you from using them. "comp.lang.cplusplus" "alt.fan.amos-and-andrew" -
you've got to be kidding.
Perhaps the MS-DOG software should keep a separate database of
the newsgroup names and give up trying to make use of its
useless filesystem.
--
Citizen Chapman, Esq.
Sic Semper Tyrannis Live Free or Die! Don't tread on me!
Nick Leverton
Alan Brown <al...@papaioea.manawatu.planet.co.nz> writes:
>These are all a pain in the ass for people running MS-DOG based news
>servers as the + character is illegal in directory names, necessitating
>manual intervention in the active file for such groups...
If your newsreader has a bug which causes such problems, why not change
to one which hasn't ? Or get the author to fix it. I've used several DOS
newsreaders - Snews and CPPnews come to mind right away - and neither of
them suffers such a defect.
N.
David B Criswell
>Russ Allbery (r...@Xenon.Stanford.EDU) wrote:
>
>: I do not think supporting MS-DOS based news servers should be a
>: consideration in Usenet group naming policy.
>
>: (Yes! I always wanted to be able to say that! :) )
I agree with this. Naming policy should not be tied to any
particular OS.
>Heh.
>
>But...msdos-based news SERVERS? Do such beasts actually exist?
>How on earth could a full server be crammed into a 640K address
>space? Or is this just something that spools articles locally
>without forwarding them on...?
Nathan, the 640K limit hasn't been relevant for large programs
for at least 6 years. There's dozens of ways around it, many
of them free.
>Anyhow, I agree. MS-DOS also does not implement symbolic links
>(aka aliases, shadows), which makes it an unsuitable environment
>for operating a server from the get-go.
More than one way to skin a cat, you know. The 8.3 character
limit on filenames pretty much rules out having a newspool
directory based on group names anyhow. In the past, I've
contemplated the pluses/minuses of storing news in a database,
then maintaining the spool with standard database tools. I'm
not convinced that this is the optimal way to do it, but it's
a possibility.
Disclaimer: Yes, I do work for a large database company, and yes,
I have heard the adage about everything looking like a nail.
Dave Criswell
Oracle Corporation
Tim Smith
>But...msdos-based news SERVERS? Do such beasts actually exist?
>How on earth could a full server be crammed into a 640K address
>space? Or is this just something that spools articles locally
>without forwarding them on...?
(1) What makes you think a server needs to be large? On Unix, INN
is under 500k.
(2) DOS extenders break the 640K limit. Many DOS compilers come bundled
with royalty-free DOS extenders, and the gcc port to DOS includes a
GPL'ed DOS extender, I believe.
>Anyhow, I agree. MS-DOS also does not implement symbolic links
>(aka aliases, shadows), which makes it an unsuitable environment
>for operating a server from the get-go.
I disagree. You are making the assumption that a server
must mirror the newsgroup heirarchy in the directory structure,
with cross-posting handled by making links (symbolic or hard).
This might be reasonable on Unix systems if you want to support
newsreaders that fetch the articles directly, rather than using
NNTP, but if the server is going to only support NNTP access,
there is no reason to use that model.
--Tim Smith
David.W...@bnr.co.uk
Archive-name: usenet/creating-newsgroups/naming/part1
Last-change: 28 Nov 1994 by David.W...@bnr.co.uk
Changes-posted-to: news.misc
[This is a draft FAQ, proposed for inclusion in news.announce.newusers.
It has not yet been sent to news.answers for approval, so the Archive-name
above is just a proposal. After a few rounds of posting this as a draft,
it'll be added to news.answers. Corrections or improvements to the FAQ
should be sent to the author; please Cc: me on comments about the
appropriateness of the newsgroups that this is posted to. --
netan...@deshaw.com]
Guidelines on Usenet Newsgroup Names
"To-day we have naming of parts."
This document is intended to be a primer for use by those involved in
creating new Usenet news groups, namely in the comp, sci, soc, rec, news,
misc and talk groups. The same principles may be used with other
hierarchies, but those are beyond the scope of this document.
Usenet news group names are structured, hierarchic, taxonomic but not
definitive. They are intended to help users find what they want and news
administrators manage their systems, to the benefit of their users.
By understanding each of these concepts, you can understand how to
select suitable names for new news groups.
Structured
News group names are structured into parts separated by dots, for
example "rec.pets.dogs". Each part may be up to 14 characters long,
and should consist only of letters, digits and "-", with at least
one letter.
Hierarchic
Russ Evans
In article <3jm2gr$6...@nntp1.u.washington.edu>, Tim Smith writes:
> (1) What makes you think a server needs to be large? On Unix, INN
> is under 500k.
You must have a tiny feed. Mine usually runs somewhere between 8 and
10 MB ...
Russ