On Friday 12 February 2010 20:41, Keith R Bainbridge wrote: > Which leads me to why some dislike top posting. If I am following a long > thread the last thing I want to do is page down over the information I have > read before. I want to simply read the new bit that some kind person has > added. (If I need a reminder of what has gone before, I simply scroll. But > if I am interested in the thread this rarely happens.) If a thread becomes > complex, answers should be inserted where they are relevant.
That is why for mailing lists it is recommended to prune non-essential text from the emails (to limit quoted text) and only reply to the relevant portions. If you wish to trace back the discussion then you open old emails. > Surely if I thank somebody for their help, they are entitled to see my > thanks quickly. Indeed, they are. Therefore in a reply to a newbie post - which often raises multiple points - it is better to reply to each relevant point directly beneath the relevant point. This is an inline, interleaved or interspersed reply and is recommended by the mailing list guidelines for OO.o lists. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posting_style#Inline_replying http://www.openoffice.org/ml_guidelines.html (see Replying) > I suspect this will start a flame or two, but I am passionate about this. Then why post. This is not how you get things changed here; This is however how you start a flamewar which detracts from the main purpose of this list - to help other users in need. Though well-meaning these post often contribute to the anarchic look of the list emails giving nay-sayers ammunition to discount the list as worthless. On a developer list such a post would be heavily flamed to prevent discussion of this type - as all developers understand the principles of a mailing list which is not normal nor business email. To make a suggested change to the mailing list guidelines you need to understand how an open source project works. This is a Request For Enhancement (RFE) wherein you are requesting a change to the mailing guidelines of the lists (plural) including developer lists OR you are requesting this list to be treated differently to the others which would entail separate guidelines for this list only. To place a RFE you need to register on the QA website: http://qa.openoffice.org/ Then open a bug report to get the mailing list guidelines changed. It will be considered (or seen as a duplicate of another report) and in this case probably closed as frivolous immediately. The style of emails in mailing lists and newsgroups has evolved a long time ago. http://catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html Mailing lists are not like personal emails, nor are they like business emails. Generally business emails are written by people who are not technology savvy but are employed in a business. Thus instead of a well thought out protocol for emailing, business emails tend to adopt personal email techniques. Afterwards businesses may adopt rules which often are aimed at protecting the rights of the business rather than improving the email techniques. HTH -- Michael --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [email protected] For additional commands, e-mail: [email protected]
