[Glastonbury] bits

[Andrew M.A. Cater]

On Tue, Dec 07, 2004 at 10:28:42PM +0000, Rick Fitzsimmons wrote:
> And another thing...
> Some people seem to "reply" to a message, then change the subject and 
> start a new topic. Aaargh! If you display the list sorted by thread, new 
> topics pop up in the middle of threads. Very unhelpful :-(
> 
> (This thread started as "My CUPS floweth not", then became "suse 
> licence", then "bits" !)
> 
Advice given to the list over the last couple of years on several
occasions: learn to ask sensible questions.

To which we should perhaps now add: learn to use the threading features
of your mail client.

One convention which is useful though slightly time consuming is for
someone to post a summary of a long running thread and to use this
as a datum point for further discussion. Alternatively, ask for replies
OFF-LIST and volunteer to post a summary where replies are likely to be
long-running or unduly contentions.

> And finally - do we prefer top or bottom posting? That question normally 
> raises the temperature a bit...
> 
A. Yes
> 
> 
> Martin Wheeler wrote:
> >On Tue, 7 Dec 2004, Alistair Parsons wrote:
> >
> >>sorry meant to send this just to tim
> >

Q. Are you sure?
> >
> ><religious rant>
> >That's because there *was* a majority opinion of list-folk at one time 
> >who insisted that the "sensible" [note the prophylaxis of the lift-out] 
> >way to set up the list was to remove the default 'Reply to Poster' and 
> >make it the highly dangerous and objectionable 'Reply to List' instead.
> >

A. Because it interrupts the natural flow of the material and replies.

> >
> >I *told* you all it would end in tears.
> >
> >Don't you just hate the mentality fostered in gullible minds by being 
> >brought up on trash Yahoo! lists, and thinking for evermore that their 
> >way of running a list is a world standard for everyone?  And as for 
> >those who can't suss out how to set their mail-agent to do what they 
> >want it to ...

If you want to reply to list - use the appropriate key strokes / button
pushes.  The Debian mailing lists (which are high traffic) operate a
policy that postings should normally go to the list but that replies 
should also go to the list and not the correspondent. It should be
assumed that everyone reads a list to which people have to subscribe (in
that case) and that they're too busy to want superfluous personal
copies. Were we ever to go subscriber only - as has been suggested
numerous times in the discussions over spam problems - that would be
most appropriate here.

> ></religious rant>
> >
> >There now; I feel much better now.
> 

Q Why is top posting considered harmful?
> 
Andy