From owner-freebsd-stable Thu Oct 14 10: 9: 7 1999 Delivered-To: freebsd-stable@freebsd.org Received: from dt050n71.san.rr.com (dt050n71.san.rr.com [204.210.31.113]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id E5679151B8 for ; Thu, 14 Oct 1999 10:08:48 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from Doug@gorean.org) Received: from gateway.gorean.org (gateway.gorean.org [10.0.0.1]) by dt050n71.san.rr.com (8.9.3/8.8.8) with ESMTP id KAA08845; Thu, 14 Oct 1999 10:08:05 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from Doug@gorean.org) Date: Thu, 14 Oct 1999 10:08:05 -0700 (PDT) From: Doug X-Sender: doug@dt050n71.san.rr.com To: Jamie Norwood Cc: "Daniel C. Sobral" , Brad Knowles , "Paul M. Lambert" , stable@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Roasting Newbies In-Reply-To: <19991012092301.A87691@mushhaven.net> Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG On Tue, 12 Oct 1999, Jamie Norwood wrote: > IIRC, Majordomo is capable of having 'post-ok' addresses, where you can > do a sort of half-subscription where you can post from an address, but > not get list mail there. It is cabable of that, but managing this on the scale we're talking about with the FreeBSD lists is just not an easy task. This idea has been proposed often, and always rejected by the very people you claim to want to help. As much as I applaud any efforts to increase the level of user education, I have to say that I think an automated response just will not do. The proper way to handle this is with a two-pronged approach. First, develop a good document that teaches people how to ASK questions (I think Greg has done a very good job with his) and then when inappropriate questions are sent to the list refer the user to it. Second, develop good documentation on how to ANSWER questions, and do the same thing. One of the keys to this approach is that your efforts must be conducted primarily in PRIVATE e-mail, especially when you are dealing with a question answerer. No one likes being backed into a corner in public, and any efforts to help in this fashion will not be appreciated. Good luck, Doug -- "Stop it, I'm gettin' misty." - Mel Gibson as Porter, "Payback" To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-stable" in the body of the message