making email easier to read

[Zbigniew Koziol]

D. Hugh Redelmeier wrote:
> The last couple of days' messages contains a few things that could be
> improved.  I'm not going to quote examples because I don't want to
> pick on anybody.

Its always worth to remind people. But everyone ought to learn by their 
own experience. At these times it is too late to educate ;) People learn 
themself ;)

> Please trim your quotes: only quote the part of a message that you are
> responding to.  This will make it easier for readers.  Do include
> attribution if you wish to (some folks think attribution does not
> belong; that is a matter about which reasonable people can disagree).

I agree with this part and do take care who send what. That should be 
clear after reading the message.

> It is almost always better to include the quote before your response.
 > If you are quoting the whole of a long message, you might want to put 
 > the
 > quote after your response.  But generally you should not quote a whole
 > message that the list will already have seen.

Yes, but...

Businesses tend to take opposite position (and they even ask sometime to 
quote entire message). Why? Because that helps them to keep the track of 
what the problem is about.

In the past I would ask the same as you did. Now, I find sometime 
convenient (and even desirable) to respond "before" the message 
quatation. I do not care anymore is the quatation before or after the 
response. Which way is better depands sometime on circumstances.

> If you have responses to several parts of a message, it is usually
> better to quote and respond to each in turn.  That makes it clear what
> each of your responses relates to.

May be...

> Please reply to the correct message.  Replying to a quote within
> another message is usually silly and confusing (assuming that the
> quote also appeared on the list).  It may be reasonable if you are
> also responding to things in the quoting message.

:) In general - right.

> Please use plain text, not HTML.  Keep your lines under 80 characters.
> Keeping them under 70 allows them to be quoted without growing past
> 80.

I am stroongly against for using HTML on mailing lists or private 
correspondence. This is simply plain silly. Allow however spammers to 
use HTML and Windows users, please ;)

Regarding spammers - this is a separate topic. Not a something easy or 
straightforward.

Now, however most people do not care about line widths because they use 
  GUI for emailing. I do support though the idea of taking care of line 
widths. People sometime do not imagine how huge mess they create by not 
taking care of line widths.

BTW, the way mail is formated is determined by preferencial settings in 
email client. Most of people would never think that they could change 
these settings ;) I bet there are such people on this list as well ;) 
So, if they use Outlook, Microsoft will set preferences for them. And 
some writing here do use Outlook, dont they? ;)

zb.

--
Zbigniew Koziol, SoftQuake^(tm) Open Source Business Solutions
Web Development, Linux, Web Mail Fax Voice Servers, Networking
Consultations, Innovative Technologies Tel/Fax: 1-416-530-2780
Toronto,  Canada,  http://www.softquake.ca,  info-lcEyp1+e+UdAFePFGvp55w at public.gmane.org
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