How to find the first ITRC forum posts?

[Steven Sim Kok Leong]

Hi all,

An urge came to me. I think I would be very interested to see the very first postings, queries and answers on the first days when the forum was just born, apart from the forum creators themselves?

Any idea how I can go about doing that?

And I wonder who's oldest contributor in the forum. What was the first question asked and who answered the first question? :-)

Thanks in advance. Regards.

Steven Sim Kok Leong
Brainbench MVP for Unix Admin
http://www.brainbench.com

[Volker Borowski · Accepted solution]

Interesting question Steven,

I checked out JRF's first "bunny"-reply, which was around half a year after the beginning ?!?

http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/QuestionAnswer/1,,0xe9637e990647d4118fee0090279cd0f9,00.html

The next link gives you the starting page of the HP-UX forum (today it was page 647, which brings you back to Nov. 1999):

http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/FamilyHome/1,,117!1!647,00.html

Do not know if this helps
Volker

[John Bolene]

User #1 may have been a creator and goes much further back than JRF.

Check this date "May 14, 1996"

http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/UserProfile/1,,CA1!1,00.html

[Sachin Patel]

Hi John,
It is not necessarry that if you see someone has profile created on 1996 means forum starts around that time.
Hp has move all technical contract account in to forum profile too.

i.e our company has technical contract and profile for that account is dated back to 97.

May be someone knows how to find first post.

Sachin

[Mark Greene_1]

this is the general link to a forum page:

http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/FamilyHome/1,,117!1!649,00.html

by changing the "649" near the end of the url to be the highest page number on any current day (taken from the "page 1 of 649:" at the bottom of the forum page), you can jump back to the beginning of the list. It is not discernable from the forum pages if hp has archived any postings older than what shows.

--
mark

[James R. Ferguson]

Hi Steven, et al.

The current Forum format (with the point system for response evaluation, and a strong user identity) dates to May 2000 as announced here:

http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/QuestionAnswer/1,,0x0e8fe8644a22d411ade70090279cd0f9,00.html

If we call this "version 1" then we can call the second, major set of enhancements "version 2", and date its birth to November 2000. Shayne Wagley, then Forum Administrator, described these enhancements in this thread:

http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/QuestionAnswer/1,,0x53ecf841489fd4118fef0090279cd0f9,00.html

Volker's and Mark's pointers to the earliest Forum page mark the beginning of the postings that are available to us. These date to late November 1999, although there is even earlier activity than these threads. Prior to May 2000, key contributors were honored as the month's "All Star". When I began participating in the Forum in July 2000, others had distinguished themselves well. Four names that I specifically remember appear below. Clearly, Alan Riggs' contributions predate even the limits of that which is available for inspection today.

Alan Riggs (October 1999)
http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/UserProfile/1,,CA216613!1,00.html

Anthony Goonetilleke (December 1999)
http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/UserProfile/1,,CA378596!1,00.html

Robert Gamble (January 2000)
http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/UserProfile/1,,CA49374!1,00.html

Chris Anuro (March 2000)
http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/UserProfile/1,,BR67383!1,00.html


The dates associated with each user's profile represent the point at which a user registered him/herself as an online ITRC user. In a large number of cases, this occurred long before the advent of the community Forum. Other than noting a user's first "bunny" there is no way to guess when someone first posted to the Forum.

Jeff Siegle, the ITRC Forum Community Manager, can certainly shed more light on the history here, and I will call his attention to this thread separately. I do know, however, that the Forum architecture is crafted after sociological research of groups and communities, not the least among that being the principles exposed here (as shared by Jeff):

http://www.mongoosetech.com/realcommunities/12prin.html

With my regards to all???

...JRF...

[Carlos Fernandez Riera]

Hi all:

IIRW Forums were created by HP Education as a place to discuss and help.

The formal #1 question was :
Subject: The 3 most ingenious UNIX line commands are ...?
(
http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/QuestionAnswer/1,1150,0xc6b5119c3420d411b66300108302854d,00.html). It seem to be missing.


The question were asked by about 20 people, with tricks. There was a response specialy interesting, about difference among unix and others O.S. 3 differences that i cant remember exactly now.

At this early time thre were few people that are contributing still.

Happy new year.

[James R. Ferguson]

Hi Steven & Carlos:

Carlos, thank you. I too remember once seeing that question. The link you posted translates to the following (after the last ITRC re-index):

http://forums.itrc.hp.com/cm/QuestionAnswer/1,,0xc6b5119c3420d411b66300108302854d,00.html

Regards!

...JRF...