FAQ: biz.sco.* newsgroups/mlists (periodic posting)
Ed Hew
Posting-Frequency: monthly
X-Version: 2.02d
X-Original: Fri May 10 12:17:43 EDT 1991
X-Revised: Fri Mar 31 00:01:38 EST 1995
*** Please be aware of the CFV effectively proposing ***
*** reorganization of biz.sco.* into comp.unix.sco.* ***
Evolution of SCO newsgroups and Mailing Lists
---------------------------------------------
A Bit of History:
----------------
Many readers enjoyed the opportunity to obtain and contribute useful
information on SCO Open Desktop since 1990 through the ancestral USENET
newsgroup sco.opendesktop or it's companion mailing list. Similarly,
there was a demonstrated need for an information and discussion forum
for SCO products in general.
With the increasing demand for accessibility and for additional SCO
newsgroups, many current contributors including those who have been
active in circulating SCO related newsgroups and mailing lists felt
that the readership would be best served by creating a biz.sco.*
hierarchy to improve propagation (and hence availability) worldwide.
biz.sco.{opendesktop,general,announce} were newgrouped May 1, 1991 in
accordance with accepted procedure within "biz". Given the content,
this change relocated the "opendesktop" newsgroup to a more proper place
within the established usenet news hierarchy and adds the new "announce"
and "general" groups. On Aug 1, 1991, the former "sco-...@uunet.uu.net"
became "scogen" in keeping with established biz.sco.* naming conventions.
biz.sco.binaries and biz.sco.sources were newgrouped on June 1, 1992
to respectively accommodate SCO Xenix, UNIX and OpenDesktop specific
binaries and source code. The binaries and sources news groups are
moderated, with moderator and submissions information and policy
outlined in the periodic imformational postings in those newsgroups.
Respecting USENET etiquite, these newsgroups are _not_ gated to
mailing lists, but are archived on several nuucp and ftp hosts.
biz.sco.magazine was newgrouped Dec 14, 1992, to provide a discussion
area for the readers, writers and publishers of the original SCO Magazine
and now SCO World Magazine.
biz.sco.vtcl replaced biz.sco.wserver (first newgrouped Sep 15, 1993),
on Sep 5, 1994, reflecting the revised version of the SCO technology
formerly referred to as the "Widget Server".
Newsgroups and Mailing Lists:
----------------------------
Subject to the USENET NEWS hierarchies carried by your upstream feed,
you are able to subscribe to the following:
Newsgroup mailing list subscription
--------- -------------------------
biz.sco.opendesktop scoodt-...@xenitec.on.ca
biz.sco.general scogen-...@xenitec.on.ca
biz.sco.announce scoann-...@xenitec.on.ca
biz.sco.sources <none>
biz.sco.binaries <none>
biz.sco.magazine scomag-...@xenitec.on.ca
biz.sco.vtcl scovtcl...@xenitec.on.ca
You are _strongly_ encouraged to obtain these newsgroups via USENET
NEWS mechanisms vrs email. Anyone having difficulty arranging a news
feed for these newsgroups is welcome to email the undersigned and
I'll do my best to help. We also offer all required software in
source code form via anonymous FTP and UUCP, as do many archive sites.
If, after having explored all options, you are still unable to receive
biz.sco.* as news, you may subscribe to the mailing lists.
The 5 discussion newsgroups are bi-directionally gated to companion
mailing lists, so anyone not having access to NEWS but who does have a
UUCP or Internet mail feed can still participate fully using email.
Mailing list subscribers should send their request to the appropriate
"mailing list subscription" address above, including in the message body:
Please use the format: Add: mailing-list your_working_email_address.
Valid examples:
Add: scoodt: your_l...@site.do.main -or-
Add: scoann: up!stream!yoursite!your_logname
Inclusion of an alternative working bang-path relative to a well know
major functional site might prove beneficial. Deletions are handled
the same way, simply substitute "Delete:" for "Add:", ensuring that
you use the exact same address you subscribed with. Subscribers receive
"how to post to the mlist" article submission information when their
request is processed. Mailing list subscriptions are free, subject to
whatever arrangements you may have with the site(s) feeding you.
If you don't receive an acknowledgment within a few days, it's likely
that someone, somewhere, is bouncing mail replies to you, and would do
the same with mailing list traffic for you. Check your routing, then
try a test message via xenitec.on.ca back to your host. You'll want
to resolve your connectivity problem before trying to subscribe again.
Similarily, should you experience a sudden and prolonged drop to zero
volume on the mailing lists, this often indicates that we are no longer
able to find a working route to your site. We loose a handful of
subscribers this way each month. If this happens to you, please email
us your known working bang-path relative to a major site.
What's in the newsgroups (and gated mailing lists):
---------------------------------------------------
biz.sco.announce: SCO and SCO Developer product announcements of
interest to current and future users of SCO products,
and to SCO developers, resellers and distributors.
[moderated by Ed Hew <scoa...@xenitec.on.ca>]
[approved articles gated to "scoann" mailing list.]
biz.sco.binaries: Binary packages compiled from SCO compatible source
code, often from source posted in biz.sco.sources
and often installable using the SCO "custom" utility.
[moderated by Bill Campbell <bi...@Celestial.com>]
[no mailing list]
biz.sco.general: Questions, answers and comments on SCO products
in general, and of course resulting discussions.
[mailing list injector: sco...@xenitec.on.ca]
biz.sco.magazine: Interaction between the SCO World Magazine readers,
writers, editors and publishers.
[mailing list injector: sco...@xenitec.on.ca]
biz.sco.opendesktop: Technical questions and answers and informative
postings relating to past, present, and future
implementations of the SCO OpenDesktop operating
environment and it's various bundled components.
[mailing list injector: sco...@xenitec.on.ca]
biz.sco.sources: SysV or BSD source code for useful programs and
utilities, modified to compile and run with various
incarnations of SCO Xenix, UNIX, and/or OpenDesktop.
[moderated by Michael Deignan) <kd...@anomaly.sbs.com>]
[no mailing list]
biz.sco.vtcl: An un-moderated newsgroup to facilitate questions,
answers and discussion of SCO Visual Tcl.
[mailing list injector: sco...@xenitec.on.ca]
You should always endeavour to post your article to the most applicable
newsgroup. For example, posting your ODT question to the "general"
newsgroup will preclude your question and answers to it from being
saved in the public ODT archives. Appropriate crossposting is allowed.
Articles destined for a moderated newsgroup should NOT be crossposted.
Articles posted to the moderated newsgroups are emailed to the moderator
who verifies appropriate content and posts the approved message.
Full biz.sco.* archives live at URL: ftp://ftp.xenitec.on.ca/pub/news/
___________
The undersigned is solely responsible for administration of the biz.sco
namespace. Suggestions for additional biz.sco.* newsgroups and/or
mailing lists should be emailed to the address below.
--
Ed. A. Hew, <ed...@xenitec.on.ca> ....!uunet.ca!xenitec!eah
XeniTec Consulting Services, Kitchener ON, Canada +1 519 570 9848
triOS Training Centres Ltd. Mississauga ON Canada +1 905 542-0656
{biz.sco godfather, biz FAQ maintainer, biz newsgroup authority.}