[plug] Newcomers' welcome

[Carl Gherardi]

On Mon, 31 Jan 2005 17:38:33 +0800, Nathan D <natdan at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Sun, 30 Jan 2005 12:45:33 +0800, James Devenish
> <devenish at guild.uwa.edu.au> wrote:
> > Hi everyone,
> >
> > Here is my first public draft of a newcomers' "welcome message".
> > This would be sent automatically to each new subscriber when he
> > or she joins the list. I welcome your revisions, and you should
> > probably post them to the list so that others than gauge their
> > feelings. When providing amendments to the message, please be
> > sure to quote clearly (or bottom-post) to make it practical
> > for us to merge your suggestions.
> >
> > PS. In light of the recent discussion about beginners, I have
> > rewritten this message. I might have inadvertently left out a
> > few of the things we previously said we should include.
> > ________________________________________________________________
>

One initial comment - the introductory section doesn't ask the user to
take the time to read the email
 
> <snip>
> You mentioned that a few things had been left out.  As the text that
> you have provided is fairly comprehensive already, you may want to
> consider posting links for additional resources?  One such link that I
> have seen referred to, and have referred to others, is "How To Ask
> Questions The Smart Way" -
> http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html (which does also
> include the section "How To Answer Questions in a Helpful Way")
> 
> For consideration and comment by all.
> 

That page has a lot of good points, some of it some off very elitist -
this mailing list has a broader focus than a true technical mailist.

Bits that could be adapted:

Before You Ask - Little bits of this in the original post, possibly
worth emphasizing good resources
Use meaningful, specific subject headers - Kinda mentioned, but quite
important I think. I personally filter just on subject line when busy.
Write in clear, grammatical, correctly-spelled language - Another one
that needs a bit more emphasis in the post. I stop reading something
that doesn't make sense, or is difficult to read due to
capitalisation.
Be precise and informative about your problem (Covered by 1 in original message)
Describe the problem's symptoms, not your guesses - "My computers
broken - I need more RAM", frustrats the hell out of me. We dont get
anything that bad here but it couldn't hurt to mention this.

Otherwise the message is pretty well written James,

Cheers

Carl G