[Mageia-discuss] IRC community channels - need a ruling from the board

Tue Oct 5 02:29:44 CEST 2010

Ar Llu, 2010-10-04 am 12:35 +0100, ysgrifennodd Romain d'Alverny:
+Let's see other projects:
+> 
+>  * http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Communicate#International has no
+> strict scheme (although it looks like a 2-letters ISO for language
+> primarily)
+
+As you can see in the Internation list, the channel for the United
+Kingdom users of Fedora is #fedora-uk.  
+
+>  * https://wiki.ubuntu.com/IRC/ChannelNaming has a strict one (2
+> letters ISO for country ONLY - no language-based channel)
+
+Being a Point of Contact for an Ubuntu LoCo team I can tell you that
+Ubuntu does indeed have language groups as well as country groups.  For
+example #ubuntu-es isn't aimed at Spain but rather spanish speakers who
+use Ubuntu.  
+
+It should also be noted that Ubuntu uses the ccTLD to set the name of
+the channel, so for example the channel for United Kingdom of Great
+Britain and Northern Ireland would indeed be #ubuntu-uk as it is.  The
+ccTLD for the UK is indeed .uk whereas Ukraine's ccTLD is .ua.
+
+>  * http://irc.mozilla.org/ has no strict scheme
+
+The Mozilla naming scheme for the channel of the Ukraine is #mozilla-ua.
+
+>  * http://wiki.debian.org/IRC has no strict scheme
+
+#debian-uk is also the Debian channel for the United Kingdom, it even
+says in the brackets that it is not the channel for the Ukraine.
+
+>  * others?
+
+Another project which uses -uk for the channel naming for the group of
+users in the United Kingdom is the Gentoo project using #gentoo-uk for
+the name of the channel.
+
+> What matters more anyway is the index we provide to route people to
+> their preferred channel.
+> 
+> 
+> So, I would suggest this for #mageia-{suffix}:
+>  0. 2-letters ISO code for _language_ (as we do today, already);
+>  1. 2-letters code _may_ be used for location/country coding;
+>  2. in case of conflict between rules 0 and 1, ask IRC management team
+> - and rule 0 is most likely to  apply anyway;
+>  3. so full location/country name is encouraged for location coding;
+> 
+> In this case, #mageia-uk would go for Ukrainian language and
+> #mageia-unitedkingdom for the United Kingdom; given the context, both
+> would encouraged to put a welcome message on their channel in the
+> coming days to help people re-route themselves in case needed.
+
+Despite every other project that you have listed using -ua for Ukraine
+and -uk for the United Kingdom as those are their respective ccTLDs you
+wish to break this uniformity?  By extending the shortened name of -uk
+to -unitedkingdom you are making it less likely for people to find the
+channel.  -uk as a suffix is an already declared identifier for the UK
+in both domain names and open source IRC projects.
+
+> That would also mean, for instance, that #mageia-br would go for
+> Breton - Celtic language, not for Brasil that would need
+> #mageia-brasil instead.
+
+Actually for Breton is more likely that they would be using #mageia-bzh
+as that is their proposed ccTLD.  The Brazilians are free to choose to
+use either -br, -brazil or -brasil in this instance.
+
+> That drives me to pre-announce that we will have some sort of a "IRC
+> Council" of admins/moderators/mediators of IRC channels, to
+> collaborate with Forum and Mailing-lists peers to manage
+> technical/conflict/discussion topics/issues and escalates to the
+> community council in case of need (more on the whole organisation
+> soon).
+> 
+
+Doesn't it make more sense to comply with the already existing standards
+of the Ubuntu and Fedora projects in regards to naming IRC channels?
+And as far as naming the channel #mageia-gb for the UK, many Irish would
+simply feel offended in not recognising their official status in the
+United Kingdom,  as a Welshman if you were to name the -UK channel
+-England or -Eng for short I would not be best pleased.
+
+Cofion Gorau,
+Christopher Swift
+-- 
+Christopher Swift <christopher.swift at linux.com>
+
+