On Wed, 2025-10-01 at 13:11 -0400, Jon LaBadie wrote:
> Tim, I think the header is "In-Reply-To: ".  Delete that, new Subject
> and body and it appears as new thread (as intended), not a sub-thread.

The "In-reply-to" header indicates that a message is a reply to
another, and which specific message that is.

The "References" header lists any other messages (by their message-ids) 
that belong to the same thread.

And together they're used to sort messages into order of which is in
reply to what, and grouping related ones together (like some kind of
family tree).

To start a new thread, both of those headers must be broken.  This is
done by sending a completely new message to the list address.  Not by
replying to an existing message and changing the subject line.

Changing the subject *only* changes the subject.  Such a message is
still associated with everything else in the original thread.  This is
fine if that's intentional (e.g. a major topic change to an on-going
conversation that really needs to continue on).

But a new conversation ought to be completely standalone, and often
even a major change to an existing one.  This is more than programming
pedantry and mailing etiquette.  People ignore threads that didn't
interest them, and burying something different in the middle of one
that they're ignoring means you may not get the response with the
answer from the one person who could solve a problem for you.

This is going to be an even bigger issue on various forum use than
traditional email.  I tend to look at all mail I receive, even though
many others do not, simply because I have a manageable amount coming
through, and I see a list of all messages in the last five days in my
mail client to scroll through.  Someone who loads a webpage forum sees
a recent list of subjects, usually *NOT* expanded into individual
messages, and is probably only going to click on a subject that
interests them.  So, as I mentioned above, something buried in the
middle of something else, is quite hidden.

And this is a statement in general:  The last two paragraphs are what
people who don't like to be told how to do email really need to
understand about why they get told how to properly do email.  There's a
*reason* behind it.  Likewise with notes about posts to the wrong list,
there's a reason for it.  And in both cases it's because such posts
don't get seen by the people who can answer their questions well.

-- 
 
uname -rsvp
Linux 3.10.0-1160.119.1.el7.x86_64 #1 SMP Tue Jun 4 14:43:51 UTC 2024 x86_64
(yes, this is the output from uname for this PC when I posted)
 
Boilerplate:  All unexpected mail to my mailbox is automatically deleted.
I will only get to see the messages that are posted to the mailing list.
 

-- 
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