on Thu, Nov 22, 2001 at 03:30:24PM -0800, ben (benfoley@rcn.com) wrote:
> in light of recent responses relative to exclusionary notions, vis-a-vis
> the elitism of debian, i would like to draw attention to the primary
> reason of my own personal choice of debian. i choose debian because i
> believe in and celebrate the idea that everybody, regardless of
> philosophical, spiritual, or political inclination, should have access
> to a functional and freely available operating system.
I believe in inclusion rather than exclusion. However, there are those
who simply cannot be realistically accomodated.
My other preference for Debian is that its methods produce a superior
product. I don't feel this is an accident.
<...>
> in my life, as well as on this list, i find it behooves me to render
> whatever assistance i can afford to anyone who might benefit by it--and,
> an aside to karsten, the shift key nazi, has it really never crossed
> your mind that access to the shift key that you, apparently, take for
> granted, might, in fact, be a redundant, because painful, luxury for
> some of the rest of us?
I fail to see how this might be so. Redundancy isn't bad. Human speach
and text are ~50-80% redundant. This provides error correction and
helps remove ambiguity in circumstances in which multiple
interpretations may be possible. Proper use of capitalization,
spelling, grammar, and presentation of text on the page/screen, _all_
add to the comprehensibility of a message. As an example, this
paragraph contains 112 redundant elements, from spaces to punctuation to
capitalization and emphasis indicators. Removing them certainly
preserves all the meaning of the passage, no?
i fail to see how this might be so. redundancy isn't bad. human speach
and text are ~50-80% redundant. this provides error correction and
helps remove ambiguity in circumstances in which multiple
interpretations may be possible. proper use of capitalization,
spelling, grammar, and presentation of text on the page/screen, _all_
add to the comprehensibility of a message. as an example, this
paragraph contains 112 redundant elements, from spaces to punctuation to
capitalization and emphasis indicators. removing them certainly
preserves all the meaning of the passage, no?
I fail to see how this might be so Redundancy isnt bad Human speach
and text are ~5080% redundant This provides error correction and
helps remove ambiguity in circumstances in which multiple
interpretations may be possible Proper use of capitalization
spelling grammar and presentation of text on the page/screen all
add to the comprehensibility of a message As an example this
paragraph contains 112 redundant elements from spaces to punctuation to
capitalization and emphasis indicators Removing them certainly
preserves all the meaning of the passage no
Ifailtoseehowthismightbeso.Redundancyisn'tbad.Humanspeach
andtextare~50-80%redundant.Thisprovideserrorcorrectionand
helpsremoveambiguityincircumstancesinwhichmultiple
interpretationsmaybepossible.Properuseofcapitalization,
spelling,grammar,andpresentationoftextonthepage/screen,_all_
addtothecomprehensibilityofamessage.Asanexample,this
paragraphcontains112redundantelements,fromspacestopunctuationto
capitalizationandemphasisindicators.Removingthemcertainly
preservesallthemeaningofthepassage,no?
ifailtoseehowthismightbesoredundancyisntbadhumanspeach
andtextare~5080%redundantthisprovideserrorcorrectionand
helpsremoveambiguityincircumstancesinwhichmultiple
interpretationsmaybepossibleproperuseofcapitalization
spellinggrammarandpresentationoftextonthepage/screenall
addtothecomprehensibilityofamessageasanexamplethis
paragraphcontains112redundantelementsfromspacestopunctuationto
capitalizationandemphasisindicatorsremovingthemcertainly
preservesallthemeaningofthepassageno
If you'd care to explain how use of the shift key is an impossibility,
I'm all ears.
Also, I'd recommend you fix your mailer wrap (adjusted in quoted
portions above). And I'm curious as to the reasons for your off-list
post.
For a more general rant:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
While this isn't grade school, grammar matters, particularly if you're
trying to get someone to help you with a problem.
I prefer a consistency of message formats. If I have to decode a
message's format before I can begin to decode its meaning, then, with my
current mail load of several hundreds of mails a day, I'll defer to
another post. With a sufficient quantity of material, rapid heuristics
become more useful than accurate ones. I've found, however, that speed
and accuracy are highly correlated goals in sorting (and discarding)
poorly composed email.
Posts which are grossly misspelled, mispunctuated, lack capitalization,
paragraphing, coherent thought, or are otherwise tiresome to read tend
to get lower priority than those that are well-formed, scannable, and
engaging.
Hence, I say: write as if you're asking a favor of your reader. Very
often on mailing lists you are.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
You should also prefix each quoted line with an appropriate quote
character. A '> ' or '>' for each level of quotation should be
included, e.g.:
> > Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit, sed
> > diam nonummy nibh euismod tincidunt ut laoreet dolore magna
> > aliquam erat volutpat.
>
> Ut wisi enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exerci tation
> ullamcorper suscipit lobortis nisl ut aliquip ex ea commodo
> consequat.
Note also that you should _include_ an attribution line for each level
of quoting in your message, e.g.:
on Tue, Sep 04, 2001, Karsten M. Self (kmself@ix.netcom.com) wrote:
so that quotes may be attributed to their authors. You should _exclude_
signature blocks at the end of messages from your quoted context.
If possible, flow text that has been quoted, e.g.:
> Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit,
> sed diam
> nonummy nibh euismod tincidunt ut laoreet dolore magna
> aliquam erat
> volutpat. Ut wisi enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud
> exerci tation
...is far harder to read than:
> Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit,
> sed diam nonummy nibh euismod tincidunt ut laoreet dolore
> magna aliquam erat volutpat. Ut wisi enim ad minim veniam,
> quis nostrud exerci tation
A good text editor (I use and recommend vim) can do this automatically.
"Email Quoting" from the Jargon File.
http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/jargon/html/Email-Quotes.html
Most netters view an inclusion as a promise that comment on it will
immediately follow. The preferred, conversational style looks like
this:
> relevant excerpt 1
response to excerpt
> relevant excerpt 2
response to excerpt
> relevant excerpt 3
response to excerpt
or for short messages like this:
> entire message
response to message
Thanks to poor design of some PC-based mail agents, one will
occasionally see the entire quoted message after the response, like
this:
response to message
> entire message
but this practice is strongly deprecated.
Fixing quoting problems with Microsoft Outlook
As a large number of people use Microsoft Outlook, ("Outlook is a
security hole that also happens to be an e-mail client", Steven J.
Vaughan-Nichols [1]) despite the many security exploits associated with the
program, to say nothing of its flouting of Internet mail standards, I've
assembled the following directions to achieve a closer conformance with
Internet mail standards. See also:
http://www.lemis.com/email/fixing-outlook.html
To set linewrap, quote character, and non-HTML mail preferences:
From the "Tools" menu, chose "Options...".
To set Plain Text as the default format:
Click the "Send" tab. Under "Mail Sending Format", select
"Plain Text".
To wrap lines at 72 characters:
While still on that same tab, click the "Plain Text Settings"
button to bring up the "Plain Text Settings" dialog. Edit the
value of the "Automatically wrap text at __ characters, when
sending" field to 72.
To set the prefix character:
While still on the "Plain Text Settings" dialog, ensure that the
"Indent the original text with __ when replying or forwarding"
field is checked, and that "> " is selected in the drop box.
(Both should be so by default.)
Thanks to Dan Martinez for this information.
--------------------
Notes
1. Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols "The best way to stop 'ILOVEYOU' is to
stop using Outlook." Sm@rt Reseller.
http://membrane.com/security/secure/Microsoft_Outlook_Express.html
Thank you.
--
Karsten M. Self <kmself@ix.netcom.com> http://kmself.home.netcom.com/
What part of "Gestalt" don't you understand? Home of the brave
http://gestalt-system.sourceforge.net/ Land of the free
Free Dmitry! Boycott Adobe! Repeal the DMCA! http://www.freesklyarov.org
Geek for Hire http://kmself.home.netcom.com/resume.html
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