Re: A surprising discovery?

[Ray Keefer <Ray.Keefer@eng.Sun.COM>]

Hi,

> Hi Axel, Ray, and all:
> 
> Sorry, maybe I missed something in the past. I didn't know about the "non
> technical" list until today. I signed up to it just now so this should be my
> last "non technical" message to the sub related list. I will take this
> discussion there in the future now that I know about it.
> I like the idea of a public list that just includes the informative "gems"
> without all the dirt. I think that would help the new members to the list. It
> would show them things that have already been covered by the group without
> having to read a 1000+ useless e-mails to find the gems. 

One man's useless e-mails would be another man's gems. We have such a wide
range of skills, experience and interest here that it would really be hard
to weed out the "gems". I do try to an extent. Those items end up as part of
the web page.

> I realize someone
> would have to weed out the list and that would be a big job at first but
> it's just an idea to think about. 

Yes, it is a lot of work. Some days I want to say stuff it and turn the 
site maintenance to someone else. But then I start thinking that, hey this
is really interesting, I would regrete not being an intimate part of PSubs.

> As it is now it can be hard to find the
> gems because of the shear size of the archives. Maybe I should look first,
> but is there any type of list search engine on the site yet? If not, I think
> it would be a great idea to add one, for members use that is.

Good idea. Can someone work this issue. My skills are just up to basic
HTML maitenance level.

> When I went to look at the list sign up page,  I now see a (New?) big,
> flashing, red disclaimer (this is good), but I don't remember seeing it when
> I signed up many months ago. Part of it says,
> "All messages sent through our mailing lists are archived and open for public
> inspection on this web site." 

This disclaimer was put in place when some dweeb back east threatened law
suit because HIS ideas were being archived dispite the fact that archiving is
a standard  practice amoung news groups. We even had to delete several
months of archives to placate this guy. 

> This statement leads me to believe that you
> must come to the p-sub site to get into and read the archives. This is not
> the case at this time. 

The text is:


	The Personal Submersibles Organization utilizes electronic
	mailing lists for the sharing of ideas and issues relating to personal
	submersibles and AUV/ROV vehicles. Participation is world wide and
	cover a large range of experience. Our mailing list is open
	to the general public and we encourage you to join us whether you simply
	of building/owning a PSUB or have already built one and are using it.

	[blink in red]
	IMPORTANT NOTICE:
	[stop blinking]	

	[red text]
	The intent of this site is to share information freely. All messages 
	sent through our mailing lists are
	archived and open for public inspection on this web site. If you
	do not want your ideas or comments shared or archived, please do not 
	subscribe
	to any mailing lists on this site.  By subscribing to our mailing lists
	you acknowledge agreement to these terms.

The archives are available through the web site. They are not controlled.
They are open to the public.

>This don't bother me so much, but getting into them
> directly from outside the site without the disclaimers does not sound like a
> good idea to me. 

These files are at the web site. Anyone with the correct URL can access them.
That is the way HTML and the World Wide Web works. 

If there are ways to lock them up then please let me know.

> It's not so much that I have said anything in the group
> that I would want removed or hidden, but anything we say taken out of the
> context of the group and the list has the potential to be taken or used the
> wrong way. 

Good point. However if someone directly accesses the files then they will
bypass any disclaimer we might have.

> I guess until something changes I will have to be very careful
> and reconsider everything I might post to the group, as now I know the
> "group" is the world, not just 92 P-subers. 

That is a good policy for any Ethernet medium. E-mail, listserver groups,...
anything you send out over the web is NOT private. If you want a more
private medium then go snail mail, phone calls, person-to-person....
Consider everything you say on the web as public.

> If you don't hear much from me
> any more, this would be the reason I'm keeping quiet. 

Understood. I understand your concerns. Being sued was a very big concern
on my part when I started up this site. One lawsuit would wipe out my
future and any dreams of owning my own PSub. But my decision came down to
this. If we can save lives by having the site then it is 
well worth it.

> A possible solution;
> I have been told that the site archives can be protected. To keep the search
> engine robots from going through archives in the future, you can create a
> file called robots.txt. The file should look like the following,
> 
> User-agent: *
> Disallow: /mlist/archive/
> Disallow: /path/to/any/other/folder/you/do_not/want/indexed/
> 
> This file needs to be placed in the sites root directory so the robots can
> access it by going to, http://www.psubs.org/robots.txt
> More information on this is available at;
> http://info.webcrawler.com/mak/projects/robots/exclusion-admin.html
> http://www.altavista.com/av/content/addurl_exclude.htm
> After this is done then you can re-register the site with the search engines
> and they will remove the archive references from their index.
> 

I put the file /www.psubs.org/robots.txt in place with:

User-agent: *
Disallow: /mlist/archive/



Regards,
Ray