I like this approach!

Let's just start using these tags!

I have made a better overview over the existing tags in table format (two
tables: widely used and free to be used tags) at the beginning of
	http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/1962
. For bookmarking it...

Greetings,

Stephan


Hannes Hirzel wrote:

<snipped> 

> 4. Additional Squeak Mailing List Conventions to aid filtering
> --------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> This list uses some conventions at the moment
> (See also 'Reporting Bugs and Fixes'
> http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/398 )
> 
> In the title string tags are used in a operative sense:
> [Bug]        Bug report
> [Fix]        Fix for a bug
> [ENH]        Enhancement
> [GOODIE]     Little addition which can be little application or some
>              change of Squeak like changing the appearance
> [ANN]        Announcement of a major addition
> [Q]          Question
> [Newbie]     Question by a newbie or somebody how thinks he is one.
> 
> I propose that there would be a considerable benefit in this system if
> some more generally accepted tags would be used.
> There should't be too many of them as they have to be known by heart for
> ease of use.
> 
> The following is a proposal for additional content oriented tags:
> (alphabetical order)
> 
> [Deployment] Deployment related topics like "majorShrink" issues,
>              release number questions, configuration questions and
>              the like.
> [Dynabook]   Conceptual issues regarding the dynabook vision and
>              it's implementation.
> [EToys]      EToys related things
> [HW]         Topics related to a specific Hardware (for example iPaq
>              implementation)
> [IDE]        Integrated Development Environment; topics regarding
>              browser variants, inspectors explorers and the debugger.
> [Idea]       Tag for discussing new ideas what to do with Squeak
> [IO]         Input / Output related things like driving a lego RCX, serial
>              connection
> [Morphic]    General Morphic related topics (Design patterns, usage,
>              missing things)
> [Multimedia] Multimedia issues like how to use squeak for presentations
>              and font, sound,  graphic and movie related issues.
> [Reln.n]     Issues specifically in connection with a specific official
>              release n.n like 3.0 (the last one)
> [SqApp]      Squeak applications like Celeste, Scamper, PDAMorph, Nebraska
> [ST]         General Smalltalk related issues
> [Teach]      Discussion on how to teach Squeak or how to use Squeak in
>              teaching.
> [Tutorial]   Squeak tutorials (for example Dan Shafer and John
>              Hinsley asking questions when they are developing
>              tutorials just to mention two recent authors, or users
>              of tutorials who want them to have updated.)
> [VM]         Virtual Machine related topics (VM Maker, code generator,
>              porting efforts)
> [XP]         Recently people have been beginning to use this list as
>              a very moderate kind of Extreme Programming (XP) style
>              through email by posting unfinished things (e.g.
>              change sets) and asking other to participate. This hasn't
>              been the case in the past and I think this is very
>              valuable.
>              However not everybody want's to join in and even shouldn't
>              therefore by having a mailfilter directing the messages
>              marked with [XP] to a subfolder everything would be fine.
> 
> Why use this tags?
> 
> The tags should serve the sole purpose of dividing up the chunk of a 1000
> or so mails per month into more managable chunks.
> 
> They should be understandable without having to consult this list.
> This list has the purpose of coming up with a proposal for a
> commonly agreed set.
> 
> The other purpose of these tags is that derived services are still easy to
> implement.
> 
> Several of the tags can be used in the same message title if necessary.
> 
> Tag application examples
> 
> For example there are VM implementors which do a excellent job for the
> community. However that's not in everybodys focus. So a tag discussing
> VM issues would allow easy filtering and archiving. A swiki like the
> German User's Groups bug tracking swiki could collect VM-related things.
> 
> Another example: Some people are interested in EToy others are not. This
> tag helps to separate mail.
> 
> The [Teach] tag could be used to set up a swiki with copies of the mails
> where people could further add things for tutorials and instructions.
> 
> Implementation of these additional tags
> 
> Additional tags can be introduced gradually as we need them. And they can
> as well be used without to much consultation as long as we don't have too
> many of them (say less then 20).
> 
> 5. Summary
> ----------
> 
> I consider it important to organize the discussion around concepts.
> For this purpose the mailing list is a valuable tool.
> 
> However to facilitate automatic processing / filtering it helps to
> have a common more or less agreed set of general tags.
> Somewhat overlapping tags are OK as as long as there are not too many.
> 
> So I propose to use semantic tags like the ones listed under Point 4
> consistenly in the title string of the mails.
> Implementation: 'As we go along, just use them'.
> *Nobody* will complain having some more tags in the title string.
> 
> The costs of implementing other solutions are considerable for the
> community.
> This solution costs very little (time and cognitive effort) but brings a
> big additional value with existing tools and setups.
> 
> 6. Further steps
> ----------------
> 
> I put this mail unchanged (besides some formatting) as well on the Swiki:
> 
> http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/1962
> 
> Just edit it and change it or add things. You may reedit it completely.
> I don't mind or if I do, I will change things again. ;-)
> 
> I would like to see a more or less commonly agreed tagset ("controlled
> thesaurus").
> 
> This does not contradict the the fact that we can already *start now*
> using
> these additional tags. We'll see what works and what doesn't.
> It will be no big issue if for some time there is some inconsistency.
> In fact it will be better not worse. It was actually the same thing with
> the already existing tags.
> 
> A typical very simple application scenario will then be to set up a mail
> filter which puts mails within one group of tags (a personal selection) in
> one folder and the rest in another folder.
> 
> Hannes Hirzel

-- 
Stephan Rudlof (sr at evolgo.de)
   "Genius doesn't work on an assembly line basis.
    You can't simply say, 'Today I will be brilliant.'"
    -- Kirk, "The Ultimate Computer", stardate 4731.3