[FM Discuss] Sorting it all out

[dwp]

hey!

post this to the list for discussion!

:)

adam

OK

Hello Adam and all: I am a retired technical writer. Although i made an early contribution through the Floss site, lately i have been noticing the ever increasing variety of subjects that are addressed in the mailing list. Those who are interested in any subject need to sort out those E-mails that address their interest, then respond to them. Currently there is a mixture of E-mails covering, in no particular order:

•  Credit for authorship 

•  Translation: into Spanish, Hindi, Russian, etc.

•  Booki vs Floss vs other composing tools: That particularly aspect is  a confusion factor because I feel it can leave contributors uncertain as to which "system" they should be directing their contributions. Also unknown are whether authors conributing to one are seen or known to those contributing to another. 

•  Sugar

•  Links or referrals

•  code sprint

•  Professional technical writers contributing to the open source documentation process; Getting credit and/or some payment; Good resume material. 

And many more, not necessarily connected to each other. Note: The thread feature in E-mail kind of helps but it is still a mish-mash. 

Additonally, depending on the E-mail setting by the sender, the E-mails may or may not contain text of E-mails to which they are replying, and so on back. Wheels within Wheels within Wheels:)

I would suggest that all the comments now contained in those E-mails might be better submitted into a newsletter-type blog. For an example.take a look at the one created the Prescott Macintosh User's Group 

http://pmugnews.blogspot.com/

If  you examine the contents of this blog, there is the main body of submissions in chronological order. You will find that it contains

Labels:  These are assigned when a submission is received. The number of similar items is in (). Click on one of those and you get all relevant entries. 

    * accessories (1)
    * adapter cables (1)
    * Address Book (1)
    * anti-virus (2)
    * Apple Care (1)
    * Apple news (18)
    * Atom (1)
    * audio (1)
    * AudioBooks at Library (1)
    * backup (3)
    * Basics (5)
	.
	.
	.

And their are the archives: Click on an archive and you see past entries. 

Blog Archive

    * ▼  2010 (90)
          o ▼  March (19)
                + How to Format a Hard Drive
                + Copy & Paste Program
                + Quick-loading Internet Home Page
                + Comic Strip Humor
                + About These Widgets
		.
		.
		.

There's also a search box at the top of the blog.  A person can search for a particular term or name by typing it in that box.  Blogspot brings up all the entries that contain that term.  

A user can set up an E-mail RSS feed and new entries are immediately displayed in the RSS list. The RSS list provides the first few lines of every message ever sent. Click on more and you get to the main page (via a browser; i use Firefox). 

The blog is set up through  "blogger" by  google. 

Below is the window that comes up when you click "Create Blog" from any blogspot blog. 

 Create account   Name blog   Choose template

Create a Google Account

This process will create a Google account that you can use on other Google services. If you already have a Google account perhaps from Gmail, Google Groups, or Orkut, please sign in first
Email address 
(must already exist)	
 

When you finish the initial establishing of an account, you then can define the format of the blog itself. If you continue on with the instructions there will be guidance. 

One person, the editor, (Adam Hyde or a designee; perhaps there could be several) is responsible for maintaining the blog. E-mail submissions by contributors can then be assigned appropriate labels and posted. I would suggest that the person who makes the blog assign one or more other persons to be the backup, since you enter the blog by a password. Then copy or back up the blog so there's another copy of the whole thing somewhere else.


Regards: David Passell










-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.flossmanuals.net/pipermail/discuss-flossmanuals.net/attachments/20100315/e2855581/attachment-0001.htm>