moderate or dissolve this NG ??

Feel free to ignore the noise.

Moderating this newsgroup is not possible.

Removing it is possible.

Information on how to go about it can be found here:

Do be prepared to fail horribly as that will very likely be the result of any attempts to remove comp.cad.solidworks.

Usenet is comprised of many separate news servers working in cooperation with each other. Nobody owns it or any of the newsgroups on it.

It's not owned per se. There is a consortium of geeks out there that approve/disapprove of newsgroups when they are founded. There was already a discussion about this topic this year labeled "OT: comp.cad.solidworks Charter changes"

B8MB = "consortium of geeks"?

Bill,

We looked into moderating this group. Those that control the status of comp.cad.solidworks made it very clear that:

1. It was technically infeasible to moderate an existing group.
2. That the only viable alternative within comp.cad was to create comp.cad.solidworks.moderated
3. That users of comp.cad.solidworks should not use google or other news group readers that cannot filter out all the crap. Think of this solution as saying it is easier to put a crap plow on the front of your car than having the septic wagon close the valve on the back of the truck. They are probably right in this case for the simple reason that the guys driving the septic wagon don't get paid to police the content.

Those that create most of the noise on the group also:

1. Refused to clean up their acts in spite of group pressure to do so.
2. Swamped the moderation discussion making it look like they were the ones most active. This was not unexpected since they had the most to lose if any sort of moderation was put into place.

And there are a few inconvenient realities:

1. Moderation is a BIG job which requires a group of people who are willing to: a) Take a lot of static when someone is banned. b) Spend the time necessary c) Learn the nuts and bolts of news group operation. d) Spend the money necessary to maintain the moderation software and other services.
2. The core group of users has dwindled to a shadow of what it once was. Most of the good contributors have shifted to solidworks own forums, blogs, other moderated support sites.
3. The people who control moderation care very little about what is posted on any particular news group, but they do care alot about posting volume. So the very people creating the noise can swamp out those who wish to do what the group was intended to do. In other words they will make not judgements as to what a valid post should be.
4. It only takes one or two noise makers to swamp an open group to the point where it is useless.
5. In these days of free software and let somebody else do it for me there seems to be little interest in cleaning up the group, especially since SolidWorks has lost interest in an open user forum.
6. Most people are not going to be attracted to a forum that requires the level of technical expertise that a newsgroup requires just to get clean postings.

For those that want a clean feed without the cmesg postings I would suggest searching google for an alternative to their system. google has been dropping the ball lately in a number of areas, newsgroups being one, and mapping being another which is a shame.

I personally would support dropping comp.cad.solidworks at this time since it is obviously not reflecting well on our professional status as users of solidworks.

What a bunch of hooey.

If just 10% of the people who came here and posted their support for changing the status to a moderated newsgroup ACTUALLY STARTED USING THE NEWSGROUP as it is now, the noise likely would get drowned out.

But no, all you choose to do is repeatedly keep complaining about the little bit of noise being posted here instead of trying to encourage Solidworks users to post about Solidworks.

In other words, you are part of the very problem you are trying to resolve.

If you're seeing control messages outside of control newsgroups you should contact the admin of the server you are using and inform them their server is mis-configured.

That's not a valid reason to remove a newsgroup.

After filtering out posts by JB and anyone who responds to him I find, for example, 7 posts on the 17th worth even considering. But it is usable after filtering.

As I recall, you were the one who pointed out to the Big8 that Matt Lombard was encouraging people to participate in a change in this group. And you did it in a such a way to disparage Matt who, whether you like it or not, has a large following and was trying to get interest back up in the newsgroup. I can't say I have seen you contributing much to actual questions by users which is the only way to keep interest up. Prove me wrong in the next week. Let's see who can field more solidworks questions.

I don't recall BD saying any such thing.

If you can find it post a link.

Tom

You won't find a link. At the time he had his postings auto-expire.

My posts aren't displayed on Google Groups after 7 days is all. You can find them on any news server with decent retention, that discussion was not very long ago.

Your recollection of the actual events which took place is quite incorrect. I did not disparage anyone, I merely pointed out the facts to news.groups.

He encouraged people to sign up with Google Groups and post an "I agree" in response to your survey. That's not in any way promoting the use of the newsgroup, that's merely trying to slew a poll and has always been frowned upon by the people who manage the Big 8 hierarchy.

If anybody is truly interested in getting newsgroup usage back up to where it used to be, they should be leading by example BY USING THE NEWSGROUP THEMSELVES.

From his perspective I torpedoed his proposal to moderate the group. At the time that point of view was perfectly understandable but by the end of the lengthy discussion with news.groupies it should have been perfectly clear to him that is not the case.

When he realized he was not going to get what he originally wanted he looked for someone to place the blame on and that someone is me and he's still at it today. It's quite OK, I've got thick skin. But I'm fresh out of crying towels. :)

Terrific just what the world needs a bunch of clueless renegade high school drop outs like Jon Banquer let lose on a trained professionals work......so much for DESIGN INTENT and BEST PRACTICES....LOL.

According to Jon his company has 100 seats of ProE but he, a self proclaimed CNC Operator has to modify customer supplied models with SolidWorks. Got a Jonnie Bonkers in the loop, send file Read Only and make damn sure to Password Protect!

Jon, what exactly is your engineering department doing while you are hacking and whacking customer supplied solids?

Tom

"I dropped out of high school to pursue my dream of making a lot of money and never went back" -Jon Banquer -

It shows,

Tom

Good fit for Jon Banquer.

Ok, you had me at "not trained", I already agreed it is a good fit for Jon Banquer.

OK, OK I understand Un-Skilled, No Expert, Little or NO Training JON BANQUER IS YOUR MAN!!!!!

However how many unskilled, uneducated, clueless people like Jon Banquer can there be out there to fill all these NX-ST jobs?

-- Tom

s/B8MB/Usenet/

:-)

LOL!

True that. :)

Matt.

Schmatt.

Where was Matt when the survey was taken in September?

Posting on his blawg.

Where was Matt during the ensuing discussion with news.groups and the B8MB?

Posting on his blawg.

Where was all the support that crawled out of the woodwork (in response to a post on Matt's blawg) to reply to the survey during the discussion with news.groups and the B8MB when their voices were needed by the proponent for the change.

Posting on and reading Matt's blawg of course. Where else would they be?

Where's Matt now?

Who cares?

But his continued lack of presence here says exactly everything anyone needs to know about his concern for comp.cad.solidworks.

LOL...only a delusional Jonnie Bonkers could believe that by reading the thread.

You are the one that keeps posting about "design intent" JON, well actually more accurately parroting others particularly without understanding.

You can't explain design intent in your own words let alone explain how NX-ST allows you, AS YOU CLAIM IT DOES, lets you understand design intent on someone else's imported non-native solid.

Actually you said your company has OVER 100 seats of ProE and you also say they won't let you near one since all year long you have been saying YOU USE SolidWorks & MasterCAM.

Obviously they didn't give you a seat of ProE because they don't want you making changes. Silly them, they expect you to make the parts like the model not alter their model to look like the part you otherwise just scrapped.

Tom