Date: Tue, 7 Apr 92 00:08:38 -0400
From: cbmvax!uunet!grebyn.com!lojbab (Logical Language Group)
Message-Id: <9204070408.AA20902@daily.grebyn.com>
To: VILVA@viikki21.helsinki.fi
Subject: Re:  registration as a student of Lojban
Cc: cowan@snark.thyrsus.com, nsn@mullian.ee.mu.oz.au,
        shoulson@ctr.columbia.edu
Status: RO

The suggested order is to start with the materials that I believe I sent you
by email: the Mini-Lesson, and the Diagrammed Examples paper.  These will
give a great deal of the language structures.  The document overview.txt
from PLS is also a beginning document (I may be off on the .txt or .unf on
the file specifier.  

Hmm. Come to think of it, in the file read.me, I think I put a suggested 
order for beginning materials.  If so, follow it.

After the beginning materials, most stuff is on a topical basis.  The synopsis
(.whatever) is the description of the wordforms and rules for promumciation
in some detail.  As a computer person, you will probably gain much from the
BNF grammar (bnf.28) or the more specific and official YACC grammar (grammar.28)
Then, most of what is left is either wordlists, or discussions of side issues.

My suggestion is to ask questions on Lojban List.  People will answer them.
If you ask a very general question like "how do the abstractors work?" of
course, they may not know where to start.  What you really need is to see
a lot of text examples, and unless they changed their mind, these won't be
on the PLS yet.

What I can do, though it will take a few weeks to get to you, is send the
draft lessons and some text (probably from old issues of Ju'i Lobypli, 
which has translations and commentary.  We are not concerned about the
finances, if you indicate through your efforts that you are making good
use of the materials.  We have some amounted donated by people to support
interested students.  

One possibility to consider is to contact other Lojbanists in Finland or 
elsewhere in Scandinavia, and work with them.  Jusse-Ville Heiskahen, who is
on the net, has all of our materials, including the draft textbook lessons
and several issues of the journal with the associated text, but I don't
think he has ever significantly studied them.  Perhaps he could make you
a copy of his materials (more quickly than I can send them to you, and perhaps
more cheaply too), and you can work together, or if he has decided not to
study the language, he may give his materials to you (he also has never
pcontributed money, so he loses nothing in doing this - but I'd rather gain
two people studying instead of none.  WE also have another old-timer in
Finland, Toivo Kalervo, who has many materials but not the lessons.  He is
not on the net, but if he is close enough for visit or frequent correspondence,
I suspect that he would be very interested in studying with someone else in
Finland.

Postal addresses for these people:

Jussi-Ville Heiskahen
hakaniemenkuja 8A27
00530 Helsinki 53
phone +358-0-719755

email jvh@clinet.fi


Toivo Kalervo
Salontie 12
25500 Pernio

(no phone or email)

Another person with many of our materials, including the lessons is

Christopher Arnold (Swedish native)
Dimension AB
Box 20200
S-161 02 Bromma
SWEDEN

home phone 46-8-929255
work phone 46-8-980030

His email address, which has been bouncing the last few days is:
chris@dimension.se

He is worth contacting because he has many of the mateirals, including the
lessons, and can make copies for you at no cost, therefore costing only
the postage to send the package to you, which is much cheaper than from here
(and probably much faster). We have agreed to credit his account with money
he pays for such postage, so it can be handled without your financial
contribution, or you can share postal costs with him.  He has indicated
intent to study many of the materials, and was also working on translating
the brochire and some other stuff into Swedish to try to recruit more
people interested in learning Lojban.

So to summarize, read what you can, and ask as specific questions as you can
on the Lojban List - you will get answers.  (Possible questions could
include asking how to translate something simple that you think uses 
abstractors.)  Nick Nicholas and Mark Shoulson, who are major list
constributors are skilled Esperantists, so you could use examples and
problems from Esper

[remainder of message lost? - Robin Lee Powell - Feb 2010]