This is the official CFD (Call for Discussion) of the creation of a
new Usenet newsgroup for discussion of software development under the
GEOS operating system. Changes in the nomenclature of related
newsgroups are also desired for continuity. Special thanks to Steve
Main for writing the charter.
For your newsgroups file:
comp.os.geos.misc The GEOS operating system by GeoWorks for PC
clones.
comp.os.geos.programmer Programming issues on GeoWorks's GEOS PC O/S.
RATIONALE: all groups
Discussion of the GEOS operating system has taken place on the group
comp.os.geos (and to a lesser extent on the now-obsolete group
comp.os.msdos.pcgeos) for more than three years.
In that time, PC's running GEOS-based environments such as Geoworks
Ensemble and IBM SchoolView have been joined by word processors from
Brother and Canon, palmtop pen computers from AST, Casio,
Hewlett-Packard,
Sharp and Tandy, recently introduced smart phones from Nokia and the
recent announcement of republisher NuCo with the desktop product known
as New Deal Office.
Numerous small software development firms and hobbyists have acquired
GEOS software development tools, which are used to create all manner of
cross-platform third-party software. Many third-party shareware
programs have been distributed via the comp.binaries.geos newsgroup.
Increased interest of GEOS development is reflected in the traffic on
comp.os.geos and comp.os.msdos.pcgeos: A recent snapshot of
comp.os.geos
showed that of 280 posts, 140 made reference to code, drivers, GOC, ESP,
the SDK, programming, or development. Ongoing threads on programming
have thrived for months, and numerous users have expressed a desire for
a
distinct newsgroup dedicated to GEOS programming.
CHARTER: comp.os.geos.programmer
The newsgroup comp.os.geos.programmer will be dedicated to the
discussion of software development for the GEOS operating system from
Geoworks. Topics may include, but are not limited to, the structure of
the GEOS operating system itself; the use of development tools for
GEOS, including the Geoworks SDK (Software Development Kit), Geoworks
Bindery, IZL (Interpreted Zoomer Language) from Feras Technologies,
and additional tools as may be created by Geoworks or third-party
programmers in the future; and the marketing and distribution of
third-party software for GEOS as appropriate among software
developers.
This group is intended for developers, programmers, content authors,
and others who create, or intend to create, software to run with the
GEOS operating system to assist each other and share their knowledge
and expertise. Prospective developers and other interested individuals
are welcome to participate here. End-user discussion about GEOS
software, products, and devices should appropriately take place in
other comp.os.geos.* groups.
END CHARTER.
CHARTER: comp.os.geos.misc
comp.os.geos.misc is an unmoderated forum for general discussion of
the GEOS operating system and related products from GeoWorks
(Berkeley, CA), their associated third-party development partners, and
independent software vendors.
GEOS is a pre-emptive multitasking, multithreading, object-oriented
graphical operating system which runs on PC-compatibles.
All topics related to GEOS are welcome on comp.os.geos.misc, except
those which have a more specific group (such as programming issues,
which would use comp.os.geos.programmer). These include - but are not
by any means limited to - GeoWorks Ensemble 1.0, 1.2, and 2.0,
GeoWorks Pro, the GeoWorks Personal Office Series, GeoWorks Escape,
Certified Software's utilities and games, America Online, the
forthcoming Tandy/Casio Zoomer palmtop and the applications being
developed for it by Palm, Intuit, and others, configuration and
performance-tuning of GEOS systems, bugs and "undocumented features,"
and announcement and discussion of new hardware and software products.
END CHARTER.
SUMMARY:
In summary, a newsgroup dedicated to GEOS programmers will better serve
the global community of professionals and hobbyists developing software
for the expanding range of GEOS devices.
CFV:
If discussion of this RFD results in consensus, a CFV will be put forth
in November of 1996.
DISCUSSION:
Discussion of the proposed group should be held on news.groups. Note
that
the Followup-To: line of this article will direct any followups to
news.groups automatically.
A copy of this RFD will be posted to the GEOS development mailing list,
geos-dev@lifelike.com.