Re: Asking members to trim trailing quotes, versus automation
J, I think 99% of the time that you're seeing selective quotations, it's
when people are posting via the web, which makes the selective quotes
very easy to do. I don't know if anybody trims emails much any more. I was aware that I'm an outlier. ;-) For example, having my email client set so that my replies are plain text means that it gives me automatically a standard form of bottom quote for a text/plain message (which this time I'll leave in below). Trivial for me to copy/paste the parts I want to put inline with my reply (as above). I stick to plain text for most group messages because it is so easy to work this way, and so much less easy to do it with the formatted message editor (in Thunderbird). * Sigh * That said, I'm not about to try to push my group members into doing things my way. For better or worse the world of email has (for the most part) moved on to formatted messages. Shal On 2/8/2017 2:30 PM, J_Catlady wrote: On Wed, Feb 8, 2017 at 02:26 pm, Shal Farley wrote:
Actually, I'm far from dismayed and would prefer that people take
the time to quote selectively.
I think 99% of the time that you're seeing selective quotations, it's
when people are posting via the web, which makes the selective quotes
very easy to do. I don't know if anybody trims emails much any more.
J
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Re: Asking members to trim trailing quotes, versus automation
Just thought I'd point out that I have discovered a trick that helps if you use an iPhone, and I think iPad, when using the iOS mail apps in any case:
Select the section you want to quote *before* clicking reply. Then there is nothing left to delete. Only the selected part appears. I don't think this would work if you want to quote 2 separate chunks of text though.
I prefer to believe most group members are well/meaning but fallible human beings. I have even been known to make a mistake myself.
I've done that with this post - I hope it works with io groups.
Louise
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On 8 Feb 2017, at 21:50, J_Catlady <j.olivia.catlady@...> wrote:
Seriously: Shal has made the (very obvious) point that it is increasingly difficult to trim posts on most phones.
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Re: Asking members to trim trailing quotes, versus automation
On Wed, Feb 8, 2017 at 02:26 pm, Shal Farley wrote: Actually, I'm far from dismayed and would prefer that people take the time to quote selectively. I think 99% of the time that you're seeing selective quotations, it's when people are posting via the web, which makes the selective quotes very easy to do. I don't know if anybody trims emails much any more. J
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Re: Asking members to trim trailing quotes, versus automation
Brian, I'll add, probably much to Shal's dismay, that the trend toward
"automating everything" just results in more and more and more having
to be automated because users are never taught how to do simple
things themselves. [voice=curmudgeon] Yeah, first they put wheel-y things on yer sled, then they put an engine on that. But no, can't be bothered to turn a simple crank so they put an e-lec-tric motor on the starting shaft. Heck, what was wrong with shank's mare? [\voice] Actually, I'm far from dismayed and would prefer that people take the time to quote selectively. I don't even mind top posted replies, but would prefer that the member trim everything but the relevant part. I'll settle for the immediately preceding message as a whole, but would rather have just that part of it which gives context to the reply. And in fact, contrary to current practice, I do wish more people would include some quote from the prior message for context. That's one thing I DO NOT like about the current digests: too often a member's message is incomprehensible (or could be misread) for lack of context. If there exist, and I do not doubt that there do, interfaces that do
not allow trimming of quoted content the solution to that is to ask
for an interface change. I don't even know how to non-sarcastically express my doubts on the success of that effort (asking Apple or Google to change their user interfaces for us). Or of convincing my membership not to use such interfaces. I don't think that telling one's membership that the group does not welcome, or is not compatible with, the use of mobile devices is a winning strategy for any group that seeks to serve a broad audience. I actually do not get, at any level, the resistance to trying to
teach netiquette seems to get from many quarters these days. Being polite is one thing. On that and other points of netiquette I fully agree. But the never-ending battle over top-posts and trailing quotes has gone past being simply a matter of netiquette. I've long upheld in Yahoo Groups the requirement that long trailing quotes be trimmed (past the immediate predecessor). Because otherwise the digests can be nearly hopeless. On the Groups.io platform it can (and has) been argued that the software solution is good enough that this is no longer something on which a group moderator need waste his/her time and effort. Shal
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Re: Asking members to trim trailing quotes, versus automation
Thank you Brian.? Unfortunately you and I are from a species that is
rapidly becoming extinct.
I'll add, probably much to Shal's dismay, that the trend toward "automating
everything" just results in more and more and more having to be automated
because users are never taught how to do simple things themselves.
If there exist, and I do not doubt that there do, interfaces that do not
allow trimming of quoted content the solution to that is to ask for an interface
change.
For myself, and many others, we want to select what we wish to keep or remove
and not have software second guess that for us.? I have, on occasion, had
quoted material 4 and 5 levels deep, though generally short segments, because it
was necessary, in my opinion, to keep it for context and continuity.
I actually do not get, at any level, the resistance to trying to teach
netiquette seems to get from many quarters these days.? Every context where
written communication is the norm has conventions, and e-mail lists and online
forums are no different.? There really are things that an individual should
be expected to know and consider and, if they don't, be advised - nicely and
delicately at the outset - that they need to do so.? It's really not too
much to ask, it's the minimum that should be expected after a very short period
of time - read: weeks at most - in the online forum/e-mail list world when it
comes to common points of nettiquette.
?
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Re: Asking members to trim trailing quotes, versus automation
On Wed, Feb 8, 2017 at 01:26 pm, Brian Vogel wrote: I'll add, probably much to Shal's dismay, that the trend toward "automating everything" just results in more and more and more having to be automated because users are never taught how to do simple things themselves. Brian, I never took you for such a Luddite. ;) Are you also against calculators and automated spreadsheets? Seriously: Shal has made the (very obvious) point that it is increasingly difficult to trim posts on most phones. So automation via the top-posting algorithm has done nothing more than mitigate a problem caused by automation in the first place. I don't understand the hysteria about "teaching people to trim their posts." I was on a mailing list a couple of years ago where the moderators were constantly haranguing everyone about that. It just made them sound to me like little tyrants, exercising the little power they had to slap people on the wrist. My view, as a former software engineer and designer, is that we should make things as easy for users as possible. I also love my automatic dishwasher. Yeah, I barely know how to scrub a glass any more, but so what, as long as my dishwasher works? And when it breaks down, and I complain, I don't want to be lectured on how, in the olden days, people used to know how to wash their own dishes! J?
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On Wed, Feb 8, 2017 at 12:26 pm, Shal Farley wrote: I thought we were talking about top-posted replies, where quoted matter from prior messages accumulates below. Shal, yes, I was talking about top-posted replies. It was a semantics issue. By "quoted" I thought you meant "intentionally quoted," as in, within quotes. The prior messages accumulate below, but I was not referring to them as "quoted" in that sense.? J
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Re: Asking members to trim trailing quotes, versus automation
On Wed, Feb 8, 2017 at 12:24 pm, Scott Bonacker wrote: In the groups that I participate in, there are some who edit their replies every time, some who edit only when the tail gets obnoxiously long, and the vast majority who just top post and ignore everything below. A few reply without any historical context which is another problem. ?What you may actually be seeing when a post may seem to have been trimmed by the poster, or when there is no historical context, is that either (a) the person has responded via email to a subsequent web post in which Groups.io has automatically trimmed prior posts (which it does on the web versions via the ellipses), or (b) the person him or herself is responding via the web. My guess on the fraction of people who actually trim their email posts is 0-5%. It has virtually gone away because of Groups.io's handy top-posting algorithm, which does it for them, or which does it at the next point that someone responds to the thread via the web. The problem arises when, as I noted in the beginning of this thread, the top-posting (ellipses) algorithm fails and the thread starts to grow longer and longer, not only within email but on the web. If it were to stop growing on the web, that would also stop it in subsequent emails. But with this bug, there's no automatic check on it. J
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Re: Asking members to trim trailing quotes, versus automation
I'll add, probably much to Shal's dismay, that the trend toward "automating everything" just results in more and more and more having to be automated because users are never taught how to do simple things themselves. If there exist, and I do not doubt that there do, interfaces that do not allow trimming of quoted content the solution to that is to ask for an interface change. For myself, and many others, we want to select what we wish to keep or remove and not have software second guess that for us. ?I have, on occasion, had quoted material 4 and 5 levels deep, though generally short segments, because it was necessary, in my opinion, to keep it for context and continuity. I actually do not get, at any level, the resistance to trying to teach netiquette seems to get from many quarters these days. ?Every context where written communication is the norm has conventions, and e-mail lists and online forums are no different. ?There really are things that an individual should be expected to know and consider and, if they don't, be advised - nicely and delicately at the outset - that they need to do so. ?It's really not too much to ask, it's the minimum that should be expected after a very short period of time - read: weeks at most - in the online forum/e-mail list world when it comes to common points of nettiquette.
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J, Interesting that that one worked. Not sure whether by quoting styles
you're implying there were quotes in the messages causing problems,
but there are no quotes in the messages that have been causing the
problems in my group. Then I'm a bit confused. What did you mean by "non-trimmed". I thought we were talking about top-posted replies, where quoted matter from prior messages accumulates below. And is hopefully hidden or trimmed. You don't mean that both parts are sent, though, correct? Yes, as Duane mentioned, I actually do mean that. If you look at the View Source of a formatted message (in a group you moderate) - pick one that is short and simple - you will most likely see both copies of the message body. "Most likely" because I've seen a few email interfaces which don't bother to include the text/plain version of the message body. When formatting was first allowed in email, a standard (MIME) was created for how to transfer messages which carry formatting (e.g. HTML) together with a plain text rendition for backward compatibility with email interfaces which don't support formatting. Shal
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Re: Asking members to trim trailing quotes, versus automation
Thanks for the history lesson on a word, I think.
In the groups that I participate in, there are some who edit their replies every time, some who edit only when the tail gets obnoxiously long, and the vast majority who just top post and ignore everything below. A few reply without any historical context which is another problem.
For the most part, unless they are using an email client on a computer with a full kb and mouse I think it is a too much to expect any editing. Don't fully trust automation although converting html to plain text, and then deleting extra cr-lf's would go a long way.
Scott Bonacker CPA ¨C McCullough and Associates LLC ¨C Springfield, MO
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-----Original Message----- From: Shal Farley Sent: Wednesday, February 8, 2017 1:56 PM To: [email protected]Subject: Re: [GMF] Asking members to trim trailing quotes, versus automation [note: I tried to change the subject of Xaun Loc's post while pending, but ran in to a bug. Apparently editing a plain text post while pending causes it to collapse into one wrapped paragraph.] Xaun Loc, > And the point of my reply was that expecting software to overcome the > enormous variety of email formats and universally determine what is > and isn't a quote is asking for a level of Artificial Intelligence > that far exceeds what can be reliably accomplished. That point was far from evident from your initial terse reply. Be that as it may I will concede that coping with all the variations that exist and will crop up will be an ongoing challenge for the software developer.
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Re: Asking members to trim trailing quotes, versus automation
[note: I tried to change the subject of Xaun Loc's post while pending, but ran in to a bug. Apparently editing a plain text post while pending causes it to collapse into one wrapped paragraph.] Xaun Loc, And the point of my reply was that expecting software to overcome the
enormous variety of email formats and universally determine what is
and isn't a quote is asking for a level of Artificial Intelligence
that far exceeds what can be reliably accomplished. That point was far from evident from your initial terse reply. Be that as it may I will concede that coping with all the variations that exist and will crop up will be an ongoing challenge for the software developer. Meanwhile, accomplishing what is actually needed (trimming
ridiculously excessive quotes) takes only a few seconds for a human -
especially since the human only has to deal with the one (or perhaps
two at most) email system(s) that they use. Here I'll have to disagree. My own experience (with the Gmail app on a Nexus 5 phone) is that in some interfaces it is very awkward to try and trim quoted matter. And the more ridiculously excessive the tail the more tedious and error-prone the effort becomes. When this subject came up in beta@ several people observed that with other mobile devices (iPhone, I believe) there did not appear to be any means to trim quotes from prior replies. So the ellipses button in the web site, and the auto-trimming of messages in digest, grew as a software response by Groups.io to an externally imposed software problem: inadequate user afordances in mobil mail interfaces. That it also happens to address an ongoing user behavior issue is an important synergy, but it is not the actual need that drove implementation of the feature. A related question (one dear to some members here) is: given that the mechanism exists, is there any point in asking members to trim trailing quotes, or in enfocing that through moderation? I do apologize if the word "snowflake" offended either of you - but
it is THE one word which clearly and concisely identifies the source
of the problem. Aside from it being politically charged, I don't believe it applies to this behavior of group members, in either its historical or current connotations. However, much as I love words and wordcraft, GMF is not the place for exploring the proper application of that word. So I'll leave you with this (from which I learned more than I ever wanted to know about the word "snowflake"): Shal
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Asking members to trim trailing quotes, versus automation
From: Shal Farley That aside, J's complaint about your reply is that you didn't address her question - which was about the functioning of Groups.io's software. And the point of my reply was that expecting software to overcome the enormous variety of email formats and universally determine what is and isn't a quote is asking for a level of Artificial Intelligence that far exceeds what can be reliably accomplished. Meanwhile, accomplishing what is actually needed (trimming ridiculously excessive quotes) takes only a few seconds for a human - especially since the human only has to deal with the one (or perhaps two at most) email system(s) that they use. For example, I had originally started to include more of your message in my reply, which would have included a multi-level quote in multiple blocks, but I recognized that doing so would have almost certainly ensured that the software would NOT process it correctly. By limiting my reply to a single level of quote, all in one block, the message is entirely readable without any automatic trimming AND is able to survive automatic trimming. I do apologize if the word "snowflake" offended either of you - but it is THE one word which clearly and concisely identifies the source of the problem.
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On Wed, Feb 8, 2017 at 08:47 am, J_Catlady wrote: > > You don't mean that both parts are sent, though, correct? >
In an HTML email, at least two parts are included in every email. There's the formatted part with color, text size, etc., and the plain text part, both of which are sent. The email program used and the operator's preferences determine which part is shown on the screen. A plain text email only has the plain part with no formatting. You should be able to look at the source code of any email to see what is included.
Duane
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Re: Splitting thread problem?
On Wed, Feb 8, 2017 at 06:25 am, LeeAnne Bloye wrote: I went to the first message after the post and chose split thread. In addition to what Brian just explained about surgically extracting one or more posts from a thread and splitting them off, I think the key here is your word "after" - in "after the post." If you want a post to make it into a new thread (i.e., to start the new thread), you have to split starting AT that post, not after it. J
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On Tue, Feb 7, 2017 at 05:40 pm, Shal Farley wrote: On the other hand, this message was sent in plain text and the ellipses worked. So perhaps it has to do with particular quoting styles in plain text. Interesting that that one worked. Not sure whether by quoting styles you're implying there were quotes in the messages causing problems, but there are no quotes in the messages that have been causing the problems in my group.?
an incoming message with only a text/plain message body is converted to one which has both the text/plain original and a text/HTML conversion as MIME multipart/alternatives.
You don't mean that both parts are sent, though, correct? maybe the failing cases are fodder for [email protected] I'll email support. Thanks. J
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Re: Splitting thread problem?
LeeAnne, ? ? ? ? ? ?You often have to do a couple of iterations of split followed by merge when you're trying to "hack a single post" out of a thread and integrate it in to another. ? ? ? ? ? ?If the post that didn't happen to make it is now the last one in the old thread this is the easiest situation where you would split that single post off and then merge it back in to the thread you want it to be a part of. ? ? ? ? ? ?If it's not, then you have to split the tail off of the old thread with that post being the first one in the split. ?Then split that new thread's tail off right after that singleton that you want to move. ?Then merge the singleton into the thread where you want it. ?Then merge the tail of that new thread you created to get the singleton back into the first one. ? ? ? ? ? ?There has been some discussion on beta asking about making it possible to designate a post or sequence of posts from a given thread as "the object" to be split from it and merged into another when that sequence is not necessarily the tail of a given thread, but part of the middle of it. ?I can't recall if that idea got any traction or not at the moment.
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Thanks so much Shal! ? -- -LeeAnne ?Archivist
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Splitting thread problem?
Hi all, So for the first time I tried splitting a thread. ?A member (Becky Ferry)replied to a calendar post ?and several messages were exchanged. ?
I went to the first message after the post and chose split thread. ?It worked great BUT the message posted by the member did not make the move and now I can't get it into the thread. (Pic below shows that split thread is not available now) ?Not sure if this is normal and I don't understand thread splitting?
--
-LeeAnne
?Archivist
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J, LeeAnne, Questions: (1) is this a known bug? Don't know, hadn't noticed. Though I usually post in plain text, I also use inline quoting and so seldom leave anything for the ellipses to cover up. On the other hand, this message was sent in plain text and the ellipses worked. So perhaps it has to do with particular quoting styles in plain text. /g/GroupManagersForum/message/1330What does this actually do? It causes any arriving plain text message to be converted to a formatted message. More exactly, an incoming message with only a text/plain message body is converted to one which has both the text/plain original and a text/HTML conversion as MIME multipart/alternatives. (2) what are the downsides to
using the setting "force HTML email"? One downside is that it converts a plain-text quote (the kind I use, with > on the left) into an HTML blockquote - but doesn't style it to include the customary vertical bar on the left. At least, not when received by email - the bar does appear on site at Groups.io (probably by way of an overall page style). A minor downside might be the increased size of the message, containing over twice as much body text. But this is likely to be negligible in most cases. It might have an effect on vision-impaired users, good or bad. The converted message will use a default font and size for HTML, which may not be the same as that used for plain text, depending on the receiving member's email interface. Most might consider it an upside that the converted message will have the formatted style of group links in the footer, rather than the plain text style. Just wondering these things too, and if the ellipses algorithm (what
ever that is!) ... You can see it at work on the message cited above. Joseph's reply is followed by an ellipses button [...]. You can toggle that button to see or hide a trailing quote (of the message he replied to) which was in his reply. ... can be tweaked to work for the plain text emailers? It doesn't always fail. I think it is supposed to work, so maybe the failing cases are fodder for [email protected]Shal
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Shal Farley
Duane
LeeAnne