SPAM - RFC from list admin - test-drb@ccmp.vtda.org

21 Feb 2002

...
  -----Original Message-----
 From: William Donzelli [mailto:aw288@osfn.org] 
...
  about some relatively new Windows bug, slamming AOLers

 because they are
 such "losers", and pot shots at Bill Gates. There are plenty of other
 places to rip these people to shreds. On this list, it is 
 just plain old
 _noise_.  
I guess I can agree there.  The impression I got was that that you'd
like not to see any of it.  I might even agree with that, but given
the topic of the list, it's bound to come up, and that was my point.

...
  > PeeCees (I assume in the IBM sense) older than 10
years, are, 
 > according to the FAQ, and no matter how much you or I may dislike 
 > them _on topic machines_ 
...
  The term "PeeCee" generally means cheap
clone. Real IBMs get better 
 respect that that. I am talking about crappy 386plus 
 machines. Talking 
 about them really dilutes the interest in this list. 
I agree, except (I'm not good with chronology) that I think some cheap
generic 386 clones may be on topic these days.  Again, according to 
what I've read about the topic of this list, they can't be considered
off-topic.  I don't like them, but I'm sure some people do.

...
  With this argument, almost _anything_ electronic can
be 
 related to classic
 computers. You have to draw the line somewhere. Are digital watches 
Ok, so I was on a roll  ;)

...
  included? Microwave ovens? Alarm systems? Radios and
Radars? 
 CD players? 
 Audio amps? All of these _could_ be called "computers", simply because
 they have some sort of analog computation or digital electronics, but
 I think that might really be going over the line.  
Seriously, though, I think at least any digital computer should be 
considered (and perhaps analog computers).  That's personal opinion;
take it for what it's worth.

I'd also note that I haven't seen any spark computer (as opposed to
sparc computer) discussions in the old car threads.

...
  The problem here is that _almost_invariably_ the
threads turn 
 to "Linux is
 so great, Windows sucks, I have Linux running on  
True, though, again, strictly speaking, a thread on the historical
ratio of bugs in windows vs. linux may be on topic.

...
  such-and-such Pentium". 
This, of course, wouldn't.

...
  This is NOT classic computing at this point, and
should be moved to an
 appropriate forum (and there are several hundred of them, at 
 least). This 
True -- the minute you remove the "classic" stuff from the discussion,
it becomes off-topic.

...
  is _not_ a Unix sysadmin list. If you want to run
Linux on an 
 old machine
 - great (although I don't see why - the fastest way to 
 cheapen a VAX is 
 to have it run Unix  - personal opinion) - but keep the topic 
FWIW, I share that particular opinion too.

...
  focussed on the old machine, _not_ the newest version
of Linux. Linux
 _itself_ is basically off topic, as only a tiny percentage of the talk
 about it refers to the early releases.  
In that sense, yes, but there are plenty of 10+ year old computers
that will handle running it, so if the discussion were on how to get
one of these computers to talk with linux, I'd consider it on topic.

...
  It just might be common sense, however. I am _not_
saying that these
 threads should be nipped off at the bud. If a moderator was 
 to exercise a
 little control when the threads get out of hand, perhaps throwing the
 offenders in the "penalty box" for a short amount of time,  
I'm not a big fan of "penalty boxes," but you're right in saying that
it
might help.  My original beef with the idea was only that the subjects 
you mentioned as off topic were sometimes very plausibly "dead on."

Chris

Christopher Smith, Perl Developer
Amdocs - Champaign, IL

/usr/bin/perl -e '
print((~"\x95\xc4\xe3"^"Just Another Perl
Hacker.")."\x08!\n");
'