OldTools Archive

Recent Bios FAQ

255289 Christopher Swingley <cswingle@s...> 2015‑07‑01 Administrivia: Trim your replies
GGs,

It's been six months since I've posted this and I'm seeing more and
more useless cruft hanging off the end of replies to the List.
Apologies to the author of this message, not trying to pick on anyone,
etc.:

http://swingleydev.com/ot
/get/255287/single/

Here we've got a nine word reply, a signature, then a pigpile of email
junk from multiple replies from the original thread.  I realize that
most folks probably don't even realize all that stuff is at the bottom
of your email because your mail client helpfully hides it from you.
But that doesn't mean it's not there consuming my network bandwidth
(and yours) as it's sent to every member, consuming space in
everyone's mail archive, consuming space in the OldTools Archive, and
potentially worst of all, corrupting the ability of the search to find
the most relevant results.

I don't know how many other ways to put this:  read the FAQ and trim
your posts.  Seriously.

Here's what I wrote on the subject back in December.  Learn it.  Live
it.  DO IT:

I understand that modern mail clients trimming your replies difficult
by dumping the entire message you're replying to at the END of your
reply.  This requires scrolling down, copying just what you want,
scrolling back up again, pasting it appropriately, typing your reply
UNDER the clipped sentence / phrase / paragraph, and finally, going
back down to the bottom to remove all the cruft at the bottom of your
message.

I do this every day, on every one of the many of emails I reply to.
Even on my phone.  You can do it too.

Yes, I realize this requires some effort.  Most good things in life
require effort.  Courtesy requires effort.  Following rules and
guidelines requires effort.  Please give it your best shot from now
on.

For more details, consult the FAQ.

Cheers,

ListMom Chris
-- 
Christopher Swingley
Fairbanks, Alaska
http://swingleydev.com/
cswingle@s...
255293 Michael Dawson <misterschmoo@g...> 2015‑07‑01 Re: Administrivia: Trim your replies
On 2/07/2015 4:21 a.m., Christopher Swingley wrote:
> It's been six months since I've posted this and I'm seeing more and
> more useless cruft hanging off the end of replies to the List.
> Apologies to the author of this message, not trying to pick on anyone,
> etc.:

If you set your email client correctly, you have the quoted text at the 
top and the reply beneath, this also reminds you how much guff there is 
and prompts you to trim it a bit. However quoting correctly but leaving 
8 paragraphs of text for a 3 line reply is also quite time consuming for 
people reading the messages as they have to scroll down to the bottom to 
read the actual relevant text.

If you're only writing 3 lines you should only quote a similar amount 
just so people can pick up the context.

Michael
NZ

Recent Bios FAQ