This does not apply cleanly to 7.4 Nor in 11.0-current bt they seem to have applied a block I recall is from me, & URL now points to https://lists.FreeBSD.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-questions/ So any changes can be done there, so thispatch file link renamed from motd.REL=11.0-CURRENT.diff to motd.REL=11.0-CURRENT.diff.ignore ---------- This is http://www.berklix.com/~jhs/src/bsd/fixes/freebsd/src/gen/etc/motd.REL=ALL.diff see also http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/query-pr.cgi?pr=158238A >Submitter-Id: current-users >Originator: Julian H. Stacey >Organization: http://www.berklix.com BSD Linux Unix Consultancy, Munich/Muenchen. >Confidential: no >Synopsis: diff: /etc/motd: Tell people to subscribe questions@ before posting. >Severity: non-critical >Priority: low >Category: bin >Class: change-request >Release: FreeBSD 8.2-RELEASE i386 >Environment: System: FreeBSD fire.js.berklix.net 8.2-RELEASE FreeBSD 8.2-RELEASE #0: Thu Jun 2 23:10:13 CEST 2011 jhs@blak.js.berklix.net:/ad6s4/release/8.2-RELEASE/src/sys/amd64/compile/FIRE64.small amd64 >Description: diff: /etc/motd: Tell people to subscribe questions@ before posting. To reduce noise on questions@ somewhat (& as a side effect, ensure newbies get all replies, (as some respondents just reply to lists, not to all previous thread participants, & some newbies might not realise. ) >How-To-Repeat: Read questions@ archive Subject: freebsd list admins? http://docs.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?201106202352.24196.rsimmons0 obert Simmons "There seems to be a few email addresses that are subscribed to these lists that keep spamming it periodically" http://docs.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?20110621074416.58869e66 Jerry "Unfortunately, this is an "open" list; ie, anyone subscribed or not can post. This leads to the inevitable problems that plague this forum." http://docs.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?201106212203.p5LM3NbI005159 "Julian H. Stacey" "I think we should: make questions@@@ list writable only to subscribers (if not already); & Edit /usr/src/etc/motd ... Should we send in a send-pr to edit src/etc/motd eg:" http://docs.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?BANLkTimoY58yWwdHYPrhKBzPQa0CYhxERw Robert Simmons "PR it. Sounds good." >Fix: A patch in diff -c format is appended below, & a spare copy here http://www.berklix.com/~jhs/src/bsd/fixes/freebsd/src/gen/etc/motd.REL=ALL.diff =============== *** 8.2-RELEASE/src/etc/motd Wed Nov 30 23:15:00 2011 --- new-generic/src/etc/motd Thu Dec 1 01:29:45 2011 *************** *** 13,21 **** http://www.FreeBSD.org/search/. If the doc distribution has been installed, they're also available formatted in /usr/share/doc. ! If you still have a question or problem, please take the output of ! `uname -a', along with any relevant error messages, and email it ! as a question to the questions@FreeBSD.org mailing list. If you are unfamiliar with FreeBSD's directory layout, please refer to the hier(7) manual page. If you are not familiar with manual pages, type `man man'. --- 13,22 ---- http://www.FreeBSD.org/search/. If the doc distribution has been installed, they're also available formatted in /usr/share/doc. ! If you still have a question or problem, please subscribe (free) via ! http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/subscribe/freebsd-questions then take ! the output of `uname -a', along with any relevant error messages, and email ! it as a question to the questions@FreeBSD.org mailing list. If you are unfamiliar with FreeBSD's directory layout, please refer to the hier(7) manual page. If you are not familiar with manual pages, type `man man'. =============== Patch above did not make it in yet, because some obstructed, thinking asking newbies to subscribe is too much for them. My opinion is, If new people are too lazy to subscribe they are not worth helping, as they will also be too lazy to contribute back to FreeBSD. One big reason we forgot, why we should force newbies to subscribe questions@ before posting: Newbies post a question, lots on list answer, some people usually forget to keep the newbie CC'd, others reply to that reply, also without the newbie CC'd, & the newbie misses lots of useful help. If one (as I have) goes to the bother of explicitly reminding the newbie he can track missed postings on the web archive http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo the newbie often forgets/ ignores/ fails to explicitly acknowledge that, so we often don't know or realise if our valuable time spent trying to help the newbie is time completely wasted preaching advice between each other, skilled users, with the nebie catching only occasional snapshots of responses, where the CC with his address has sometimes not been lost.