Re: RFD

Bruno Wolff III wrote:

> I saw a post indicating a request for discussion on the creation of an
> official big 8 newsgroup comp.databases.postgresql.general. According to
> the notice this newsgroup already exists in google groups and is actively
> being used. The discussion will be in news.groups.

Actually, the group does exist and is spread out on some servers across the
world. Google carries it as you mentioned, as does netfront.net.

The problem is that the postgresql groups have not gone through the offical
process that is required in order to be a comp.* group. Because of this
many servers consider the groups "bogus" and refuse to carry them. Having
a rogue "comp" group is considered bad, and the correct thing is either be
under an alt, such as alt.databases.postgresql.general OR go through the
official process of becoming a member of the comp.* hierarchy.

The process of going under the comp hierarchy is simple in that a Request
for Discussion is filed (RFD), and then 21 days later a call for votes
(CFV) is issued. That is where everyone here should vote for postgresql to
be a member of the "big 8".

There are no downsides to this, and there are huge number of benefits from
what I can see. Among them is that EVERY server worldwide will now be
carrying the postgresql group. Many don't now because it is a "bogus"
group because it hasn't gone through the process of RFD and CFV. A big
news server that doesn't carry it is individual.net.

This can only mean good things as the number of users who can participate in
discussions will increase as their news servers can carry the group.

>
> I mention this because I thought people on the advocacy list might be
> interested in this group being created as a way to help publicize
> Postgres.
>

Thank you. I would also like to mention that the RFD can be made better.
Any suggestions and improvements will be made!