Re: 1st CFV: comp.lang.ml

Re: 1st CFV: comp.lang.ml

[Greg_Morrisett]

CORRECTION:

Voting Period:
-------------
  Votes will be taken from 08:00:00 EST, February 23, 1993
  until 23:59:59 EST, March 20, 1993.
			    ^^

not March 16.

-Greg Morrisett

1st CFV: comp.lang.ml

[Greg_Morrisett]

Following the required discussion period, in which consensus appears to
have been reached, this is the first call for votes for the creation of 
comp.lang.ml.  This note contains information about the proposed group 
and voting instructions.  Please read the entire post before responding.  In
particular, please read the "How to Vote" section before responding.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
                            1st CALL FOR VOTES

Proposed Newsgroup:  comp.lang.ml
------------------
              Type:  Moderated
              ----
         Moderator:  Greg Morrisett, Carnegie Mellon, jgmorris@cs.cmu.edu
         ---------           (submission address to be announced.)
       Description:  Discussion about the family of ML languages including
       -----------     but not limited to Standard ML, CAML, Caml-light, and 
                       Lazy ML.

Charter:
-------
  Comp.lang.ml is a moderated newsgroup exclusively for discussion
  of ML.  ML is a family of advanced programming languages with [usually]
  functional control structures, strict semantics, a strict polymorphic type
  system, and parametrized modules.  It includes Standard ML, Lazy ML,
  CAML, CAML Light, and various research languages.  Implementations are
  available on many platforms, including PCs, mainframes, most models of
  workstation, multi-processors and supercomputers.  ML has many
  thousands of users, is taught at many universities (and is the first
  programming language taught at some).

  Topics for discussion would include (but are not limited to): 
   * general ML enquiries or discussion 
   * general interpretation of the definition of Standard ML 
   * applications and use of ML 
   * announcements of general interest (e.g. compiler releases)
   * discussion of semantics including sematics of extensions based on ML
   * discussion about library structure and content
   * tool development
   * comparison/contrast with other languages
   * implementation issues, techniques and algorithms including extensions
       based on ML

Moderation Guidelines:
----------------------
  The moderator will maintain and post weekly and monthly frequently 
  asked questions (FAQ) lists.  Moderation will be done according to
  the following guidelines:

    1. An article that has no relevance to ML will be rejected by the
       moderator.  However, the moderator will attempt to tell the
       poster a more appropriate place for the article.

    2. An article might be rejected if the poster asks a question that
       is answered by the FAQ lists.  However, the moderator will forward
       the relevant portion(s) of the FAQ answers to the poster.

    3. The moderator reserves the right to trim down quotations of
       previous articles and to reject articles consisting essentially
       of quotations.

    4. The moderator reserves the right to send a "poorly" written article
       back to the poster, requesting that it be re-written.  

    5. All other articles will be forwarded by the moderator.

    6. The moderator might add his/her own comments at the end of an
       article, such as [See the Commentary, pp.123-125] or
       [This question has been asked several times in the past, and
       never got an answer.]
       
Moderator Changes:
------------------
  Guidelines for the removal or change of a moderator are as follows:

    1. An RFD on the removal of the moderator must be posted to
       news.announce.newgroups, news.groups, and comp.lang.ml.
       with the follow-ups sent to news.groups.

    2. Should there be a consensus that a vote is appropriate, a
       CFV will be issued by a third party, to last not less than
       two weeks and not more than 30 days. This ballot will include
       the following options:

                    a. Should the moderator be removed? (Y/N)
                    b. The new moderator should be: (names)

    3. If more than 2/3 of the voters agree that the moderator should
       be removed, and there are no more than 100 no votes, then the
       top name in section b becomes the new moderator. Each ballot
       can contain a vote for one and only one new moderator.

Justification:
-------------
  There is currently a group for ML in the alt hierarchy, alt.lang.ml.
  This has the disadvantages of any alt group: narrow distribution
  (especially outside the US, where much ML development goes on) and
  fast expiration. Some discussion of ML has gone on in
  comp.lang.functional and in comp.lang.misc.  An ML-specific newsgroup
  would concentrate these postings and provide a focus for people
  seeking information about or discussion of the language.

  There is also a moderated worldwide mailing list for Standard ML users
  maintained at Carnegie Mellon University and a mailing list for CAML
  users maintained at INRIA.  There are now several thousand readers of 
  these lists. Currently several messages pass through these lists 
  each week.  We do not propose the abandoment of these lists, but a
  moderated newsgroup would take most of the traffic from each of these
  lists and would provide a new forum for questions general to the
  family of ML languages (not just SML or CAML).  

  People who cannot or do not want to read the newsgroup, can subscribe
  to the SML-LIST.  As maintainer of the list, I will cross-post messages 
  from the newsgroup to the mailing list and vice-versa.

  We have chosen "comp.lang.ml" as a name, patterned after other newsgroups
  that discuss programming languages, such as "comp.lang.scheme".  We have
  chosen the ".ml" suffix to remind people that the newsgroup is open
  to all dialects of ML.  While some readers might mistakenly assume
  ".ml" stands for "machine language" or "machine learning", the moderator
  will prevent irrelevant posts from reaching readers and the FAQ lists
  will clear up any confusion.

Voting Period:
-------------
  Votes will be taken from 08:00:00 EST, February 23, 1993
  until 23:59:59 EST, March 16, 1993.

How to Vote:
-----------
  To vote "Yes", send mail to "jgmorris=yes@cs.cmu.edu".  

  To vote "No", send mail to "jgmorris=no@cs.cmu.edu".

  Votes sent to these addresses are differentiated by mailing address 
  _only_;  message contents and subject lines are ignored since the 
  votes are processed by an automated script.

  If your mailer cannot handle one of these addresses, send your
  vote to "jgmorris@cs.cmu.edu" making sure to clearly specify whether
  you vote for or against the proposed newsgroup.  Use the following
  format in your message body:

    "I vote [Yes/No] for comp.lang.ml."

  If your message is ambiguous, it will not be counted (though I will 
  attempt to return your message to you, asking for an unambiguous vote.)  

  Your vote will be acknowledged by email.

Reminder of Voting Rules:
-------------------------
  - One vote per person.  If you vote more than once, only the most
    recent vote will be counted.  

  - Votes must be mailed to one of the above addresses.  No proxy
    voting, forwarding, etc.  Posted votes (to any newsgroup or
    mailing list) will not be counted.
    
  - I will not be able to discuss the vote results until after the
    poll closes, so please do not ask how the vote is going.

  - Votes received outside of the voting period will be ignored.

Thanks and remember that your vote counts!