Future Direction for PUPS and UHS

Warren Toomey wkt at cs.adfa.edu.au
Thu Jun 1 10:25:34 AEST 2000


All,
	A discussion has started up on the PUPS volunteers list about the
future direction we should take in terms of the PUPS Archive.

For those people new to this list, here's a bit of background. Originally
I set up the PDP-11 UNIX Preservation Society, the mailing list and the
Archive as that was my interest.

Since then, we've attracted people with interests in other Unixes, such
as the 4BSDs, and other hardware platforms such as the Vax, the 68k Suns
etc.

A while back, I changed the charter of the mailing list to encompass any
Unix-related questions, epecially to those systems which are now treated
as `ancient' by the mainstream, even if they are being maintained (e.g
2.11BSD and the Quasijarus project).

I also tried to create an umbrella organisation, the Unix Heritage Society
(http://minnie.cs.adfa.edu.au/TUHS/), which would allow a number of groups
like PUPS and Quasijarus to form, and so that we could co-ordinate their
efforts. I must admit I haven't put much effort into this idea.

Now, the PUPS Archive (PUPS in name, but it contains lots more than PDP-11
stuff) is accumulating more and more stuff. Some people want to see a
mainly PDP-11 archive, other want to try and archive everything before it
goes off to /dev/null.

So, I want to survey the mailing list here for ideas about the charter of
the Unix Heritage Society, and a way of setting up one or multiple archives,
mailing lists, web pages etc. as I originally envisioned.

Questions:
	- should we keep one archive, or have multiple archives?

	- if one, what structure (divisions on platforms, on vendors etc.)

	- if you have a keen interest in one platform/system, would you
	  consider becoming the leader of an interest group that could
	  sit under the Unix Heritage Society umbrella?

	- do you want to set up and maintain a more specific archive,
	  mailing list, web site, that the Unix Heritage Society could
	  point to?

	- do you want this current mailing list to stay ``all-encompassing'',
	  or would you rather have more specific lists?

One final comment before you answer. There's a very diverse bunch of
people on this mailing list, some with strong opinions. Please be prepared
to accept someone's comments as what they want, don't tell them that they
are wrong, but let us know what you'd like to see.

Many thanks,
	Warren

[ now stands back for the deluge! ]

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