On Fri, 3 Apr 2009, John Beck wrote: > Michelle> Agreed, with the exception I raised earlier this week related > Michelle> to 'always trimming unneeded quoted text form your responses' > Michelle> because 'unneeded' is too subjective. Particularly in the case > Michelle> where feedback is explicitly requested on a new discussion and that > Michelle> feedback gets trimmed not because it is unneeded, but because it is > Michelle> unpopular or controversial. I propose we strike that bullet in the > Michelle> 'general list karma' section and keep the rest. > > Simon> I disagree. Trimming redundant text is well-recognised best practice > Simon> and failure to do so leads to cumbersome, unreadable messages. > > You're both right, depending on the context. Michelle is right that one > should not selectively trim messages to alter the apparent context, and > Simon is right that in general trimming leads to easier-to-read messages. > In particular, I am trimming this reply to cite only the relevant portions, > and in doing so I believe the appropriate context is maintained. > > I think this issue is best left up to each individual's judgement, though > as one with a pet peeve about people who reply to a 300 line message with > a 2 line follow-up and cite the whole thing, I tend to err on the side of > trimming.
Hi John, Michelle & Simon - I agree with John & Simon. I believe the current policy (OGB_2008/006) should be adopted as is. The note in the original text is: "Always trim unneeded quoted text from your responses. " "unneeded" is the key word here. Any mailing list etiquette guide you look for has this same advice: http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en/articles/mailing-list-faq/etiquette.html#ETIQUETTE-REPLYING http://www.gweep.ca/~edmonds/usenet/ml-etiquette.html#SECTION00090000000000000000 and I've seen it many more times in my lifetime on the internet ;) Valerie -- Valerie Fenwick, http://blogs.sun.com/bubbva Solaris Security Technologies, Developer, Sun Microsystems, Inc. 17 Network Circle, Menlo Park, CA, 94025.
