FAQ about the Petri Nets Mailing Lists

General

What is the PetriNets Mailing List?

This mailing list is for announcements of events, conferences, workshops, open positions, books, software, etc. Questions can also be posted but further discussions should take place on PetriNets-discuss. Summaries of discussions and replies can also be posted on PetriNets.

What is the PetriNets-discuss Mailing List?

This mailing list is for more lengthy and in-depth discussions on any topic related with Petri Nets. Summaries of discussions should preferably be posted to PetriNets, as should announcements too.

Moderation

What is the role of the Moderator?

The moderator ensures that only postings of some relevance and quality are distributed on the mailing lists. Sometimes the moderator even has a minor editor role in order to ensure that the content is easier to digest by the community. Typically what is edited are subject lines and confusing spelling mistakes. (As a consequence it also becomes easier to search the archives later.) Postings which need major editing are sent back to the author with suggestions for improvement.

Why is the PetriNets Mailing List moderated?

Statistics show that typically 10-30 junk-messages are sent to the mailing list each month. A junk-message is mostly an unsolicited commercial which does not have anything to do with Petri Nets whatsoever. The moderator rejects such messages.

Postings

I am looking for something. May I use the PetriNets mailing list?

This is a typical situation where the PetriNets mailing list can be very useful. Please be adviced that you can increase the likelihood of getting answers of good quality if you compose a posting of good quality. Try to put yourself in the position of the reader. Do not make realistic assumptions about what the reader knows. Very general questions will often result in useless answers or no answers at all.
Suppose you are looking for papers related with Petri Nets and some interesting topic X. Do you wish to get attention from more people? Try explaining topic X and put it in your interesting context with Petri Nets. Try explaining what kind of answers you expect. Remember to state where you have (unsuccessfully) looked so far, which in this case typically would be the Petri Nets Bibliography. Please be specific, concise, and clear.

Which announcements of conferences, workshops, etc. may I post?

Announcements of meetings and events which have topics related somehow with Petri Nets are likely to be accepted by the moderator. The moderator will, in case of doubt, ask you for more details. If the connection with Petri Nets is not that obvious it would be helpful if you prefix the posting with a clarifying explanation. Announcements that are most likely to get accepted are those where it is clear that papers on Petri Nets are within the scope of the meeting. For instance, as a programme committee member, would you accept a paper on Petri Nets for the meeting in question?

Which formats can be used in postings?

Plain text which is immediately readable by most people and mail clients. For instance, we do not distribute TeX/LaTeX, PostScript, PDF, binary, HTML, Binhex, or similar encodings. In this way we also ensure that archived postings are easily searchable, and that the reader does not need to install/use addition software.

How may I announce a newly published paper?

Please do not send the paper itself to the PetriNets mailing list. It will be rejected immediately (cf. the question above). There are several announcement alternatives we recommend:

• Submit your bibliography entry of the paper to the Petri Nets bibliography database.
• Send the abstract of the paper to the Petri Net Newsletter.

If your paper really is of general interest for the Petri Nets community you may consider to make the paper available online as an exposition method supplementing the two mentioned above. An announcement posted to the PetriNets mailing list should include information on why you think people should read the paper and how they can access it online.

What is the language of postings?

The language of the mailing lists is English. However, there is one exception: Announcement of events, such as conferences, workshops, etc, are allowed to be in the same language as the event, provided that the posting includes a summary in English.

Why don't I receive any postings?

E-mail addresses which fail through a period of 2-3 weeks are taken off the list. It may also be the case that the list have been silent for a period. If in doubt you can view the archive of postings to check if you have received all postings. In case you see many postings on this list which you have not received, then your e-mail address has probably been removed. Try resubscribing.

Why do I get mail error messages after my posting has been distributed on the list?

We include the fields "Return-Path:" and "Errors-To:" in the mail header such that error messages are sent to us and not to the author of the posting. However, in some cases the receiving mailer ignores these fields and may send an error message back to the author. If you get such an error message please forward it, with all mail headers included, to the PetriNets maintainer.

Why is the subject prefixed with "(PN)" or "(PNd)"?

All postings distributed on the lists are prefixed with a string which is easy to identify for automatic mail sorters. "(PN)" is the prefix for the PetriNets mailing list while PetriNets-discuss uses "(PNd)". (When posting it is not necessary to include the prefix yourself as it is done automatically.)