Well, the legacy proudly stands:
"Help! All these Linux emails are flooding my inbox.
... The best Header to filter on is probably "Comments: University
of Canterbury Linux Users Group" - which should appear in the header
of every email from the list."
http://clug.net.nz/index.php/EmailListFAQ
Our responsibility is to keep it proud, through best practise.
So we know there's a UCLUG mind-meld going on. Let us debate it.
Universities achieve many things. One is the feeding of industry, with
local programmers being well supplied by all accounts. But an important,
easily neglected function is also to challenge, and not perpetuate,
hypocrisy. Science, after all, is the connection of abstract theory to
material reality, through observable testing. This is where UCLUG has
fallen down. To be precise:
UCLUG's hypocrisy is to advocate Not-Unix as Unix.
Most of what our leading intellects say is in favour of Unix, as a
culture, and I too respect that. But the O/S "Linux" is Not-Unix,
including the kernel - by licensing. So it is trite to treat this
difference as semantics, when Not-Unix solved very specific problems of
Unix divarication, in being not Unix: it is POSIX - a collaborative
standard - instead. Unix was problematic in other ways too (for a
different post [1]). Now BSD has learnt well how to survive the lost
Unix moment, in part from Not-Unix too, and retains claim to be Unix. So
what distinguishes BSD from Linux? - The fact that the latter is
Not-Unix, mostly. So we have real problems understanding their different
places in the market, without saying Unix/Not.
It is the university's job to dispel, and not perpetuate, confusion like
this. Their choices are two:
a) Take advice, and resolve the hypocrisy in some satisfactory way now; or
b) Proceed with this albatross-necklace, to wherever.
As to why resolution has not yet been forthcoming, "Linux" is used as
direct and intentional, obfuscating reference to Unix, in specific
denial of Not-Unix. And this, intelligently, has to stop.
Let us be charitable about the 'splitter' accusations, leveled today
against the GNU case - call them polemics - and point to the GNU/Linux
success at drawing together the Unix-_like_ camp instead.
Which is to say that no academic reference to "a Linux O/S" is sound
without, as its basis, equivalent note of GNU.
Therefore please can we move forwards in our accuracy, and commence
united formation of:
1) The Canterbury GNU/Linux Users Group; _or_
2) The Canterbury Unix/BSD/GNU/Linux Users Group (known as 'CLUG', for
short).
There do not seem to be many other choices available to us, logically.
May we begin dragging our alma mater out of the philosophical mire of
UCLUG. Some broader umbrella term, for our free computing movement, is
required.
Carl Cerecke wrote:
On 18/04/07, Rik Tindall <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
The club built off the "University of Canterbury Linux Users" list
requires its own, fully appropriate, name.
http://lists.ethernal.org/oldarchives/cantlug-0406/msg00720.html
<extract>
FYI, the history of the name goes like this:
On 11 Feb 1997, the first occurrence of the phrase "Canterbury Linux
Users Group" occurred in a message posted to the list by the then list
maintainer Mark Aitchison.
Back in 1998, we have another message from Mark Aitchison:
Date: Fri, 24 Jul 1998 17:05:24 +1200
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Mr M S Aitchison)
Subject: The linux-users mailing list
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Reply-to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Comments: University of Canterbury Linux Users
The mailing list now sets the reply-to: line in the header, so
beware. Some people have asked me to enable this option, and
it is common on mailing lists I'm subscribed to, so please try
it for a while before petitioning for it to go :-}
Some information about getting on/off the mailing list is on
my web page:
www.phys.canterbury.ac.nz/~physmsa/linux/usersgroup/index.html
I have processed quite a few subscriptions recently - the total is
now about 45 on the list.
Note his Comment header. The name could have been UCLU, but this was not
to be....
Ryurick M. Hristev first used the name "Canterbury LUG" in his To: field
on 16 Nov 2000
Around this time, other linux users groups began acronymising: dunlug,
vlug, nzlug, slug (Sydney).
Nick Rout posted a message to the group 31 Jan 2001, and his To: header
had CLUG as the name for the mailing list address.
Nick posted again on 19 Feb 2001, and used "clug" and CLUG in the mail body:
You can then set up simple procmail recipies, like put all mail
from clug in folder "/Mailing Lists/CLUG". It doesn't need to
do the fancier procmail stuff.
Interestingly, though, his To: header had now changed to:
Canterbury Linux UG <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Following that, Dave Lane posted on 14 Mar 2001 using CLUG in his To: field.
The Bjorn Nilsen wrote, on 6 Sep 2001:
I have just uploaded the CLUG web site to http://canterbury.lug.net.nz/. It
is minimal right now (it is even Lynx friendly), but I'm sure this will
change. I am going to look at putting links up to other LUGs and good sites
for getting Linux help. Any suggestions would be appreciated.
I think a mailing list archive would be really useful too. I remember this
being mentioned before but I can't remember who/what/where/how. Now if only
I had a mailing list archive I could find out :-) .
After that, the CLUG references on the list came thick and fast.
So, Nick, really, is the father, in an inadvertent way, of the name "CLUG".
I remember initially thinking the name was somewhat unimaginative, but
didn't really care enough to do anything about it. Now the name CLUG has
been around long enough that it's basically stuck, and I see no reason
to want to change it.
Here ends today's history lesson,
Carl.
</extract>
Force of convention is a strong force indeed. RMSian ^force of morality^ should
prove stronger.
There was no real support then. I suspect there is little support now.
[1] We must hold to optimism, that academies wish to comprehend - in
order to change - Unix-related outcomes like Virginia Tech's :-/
Some may pray.
--
Rik
