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Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8)

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  Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2012-08-17 08:36 +1000
    Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Madison May <worldpeaceagentforchange@gmail.com> - 2012-08-16 15:42 -0700
    Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Madison May <worldpeaceagentforchange@gmail.com> - 2012-08-16 15:42 -0700
      Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Dennis Lee Bieber <wlfraed@ix.netcom.com> - 2012-08-17 01:19 -0400
        Re: Top-posting &c. Ulrich Eckhardt <ulrich.eckhardt@dominolaser.com> - 2012-08-17 09:18 +0200
          RE: Top-posting &c. "Prasad, Ramit" <ramit.prasad@jpmorgan.com> - 2012-08-20 22:49 +0000
            Re: Top-posting &c. Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> - 2012-08-21 03:43 +0000
            Re: Top-posting &c. Ulrich Eckhardt <ulrich.eckhardt@dominolaser.com> - 2012-08-21 10:15 +0200
              RE: Top-posting &c. "Prasad, Ramit" <ramit.prasad@jpmorgan.com> - 2012-08-24 13:53 +0000
                Re: Top-posting &c. Ramchandra Apte <maniandram01@gmail.com> - 2012-08-24 07:23 -0700
                  Re: Top-posting &c. Mark Lawrence <breamoreboy@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-08-24 15:43 +0100
                Re: Top-posting &c. Ramchandra Apte <maniandram01@gmail.com> - 2012-08-24 07:23 -0700
                  Re: Top-posting &c. rusi <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2012-08-24 08:58 -0700
                    Re: Top-posting &c. rusi <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2012-08-24 09:39 -0700
                      Re: Top-posting &c. Dave Angel <d@davea.name> - 2012-08-24 21:37 -0400
              Re: Top-posting &c. Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2012-08-25 03:49 +1000
              Re: Top-posting &c. Ethan Furman <ethan@stoneleaf.us> - 2012-08-24 12:28 -0700
        Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) rusi <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2012-08-17 09:36 -0700
          Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> - 2012-08-18 01:43 +0000
            Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Zero Piraeus <schesis@gmail.com> - 2012-08-17 21:54 -0400
            Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Jean-Michel Pichavant <jeanmichel@sequans.com> - 2012-08-20 17:09 +0200
          Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Grant Edwards <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2012-08-18 15:34 +0000
            Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) rusi <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2012-08-18 10:27 -0700
              Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> - 2012-08-19 07:15 +0000
                Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2012-08-19 17:46 +1000
                Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) python@bdurham.com - 2012-08-19 08:43 -0400
                Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) rusi <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2012-08-20 00:31 -0700
                  Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> - 2012-08-20 17:46 +1000
                  Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Mark Lawrence <breamoreboy@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-08-20 09:12 +0100
      Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Jurko Gospodnetić <jurko.gospodnetic@pke.hr> - 2012-08-17 09:52 +0200
      Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Alex Strickland <sscc@mweb.co.za> - 2012-08-21 08:07 +0200
        Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> - 2012-08-21 07:59 +0000
      Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Dennis Lee Bieber <wlfraed@ix.netcom.com> - 2012-08-21 13:14 -0400
        Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Bob Martin <bob.martin@excite.com> - 2012-08-22 07:25 +0100
          Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Mark Lawrence <breamoreboy@yahoo.co.uk> - 2012-08-22 08:35 +0100
    Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) rusi <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2012-08-17 00:39 -0700
    Re: Top-posting &c. (was Re: [ANNC] pybotwar-0.8) Grant Edwards <invalid@invalid.invalid> - 2012-08-17 13:03 +0000
      Re: Top-posting &c. Ben Finney <ben+python@benfinney.id.au> - 2012-08-18 15:59 +1000

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#27501

Zero Piraeus wrote:
> :
>
> On 17 August 2012 21:43, Steven D'Aprano
> <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> wrote:
>   
>> There are cultures that marry five year old girls to sixty year old men,
>> cultures that treat throwing acid in the faces of women as acceptable
>> behaviour, cultures that allow war heroes to die of hunger and cold
>> homeless in the street, and cultures that top-post. What's your point?
>>     
>
> +1 QOTW
>
>  -[]z.
>   
We're closer to the +1 godwin point

JM

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#27300

On 2012-08-17, rusi <rustompmody@gmail.com> wrote:

> I was in a corporate environment for a while.  And carried my
> 'trim&interleave' habits there. And got gently scolded for seeming to
> hide things!!

I have, rarely, gotten the opposite raction from "corporate e-mailers"
used to top posting.  I got one comment something like "That's cool
how you interleaved your reponses -- it's like having a real
conversation."

-- 
Grant Edwards               grant.b.edwards        Yow! Somewhere in Tenafly,
                                  at               New Jersey, a chiropractor
                              gmail.com            is viewing "Leave it to
                                                   Beaver"!

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#27313

On Aug 18, 8:34 pm, Grant Edwards <inva...@invalid.invalid> wrote:
> On 2012-08-17, rusi <rustompm...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > I was in a corporate environment for a while.  And carried my
> > 'trim&interleave' habits there. And got gently scolded for seeming to
> > hide things!!
>
> I have, rarely, gotten the opposite raction from "corporate e-mailers"
> used to top posting.  I got one comment something like "That's cool
> how you interleaved your reponses -- it's like having a real
> conversation."

Well sure. If I could civilize people around me, God (or Darwin?)
would give me a medal.
Usually though, I find it expedient to remember G.B. Shaw's:

"The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one
persists to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends
on the unreasonable man."

and then decide exactly how (un)reasonable to be in a given context.

[No claims to always succeed in these calibrations :-) ]
And which brings me back to the question of how best to tell new folk
about the netiquette around here.

I was once teaching C to a batch of first year students.  I was
younger then and being more passionate and less reasonable, I made a
rule that students should indent their programs correctly.
[Nothing like python in sight those days!]

A few days later there was a commotion.  Students appeared in class
with black-badges, complained to the head-of-department and what not.
Very perplexed I said: "Why?! I allowed you to indent in any which way
you like as long as you have some rules and follow them." I imagined
that I had been perfectly reasonable and lenient!

Only later did I realize that students did not understand
- how to indent
- why to indent
- what program structure meant

So when people top-post it seems reasonable to assume that they dont
know better before jumping to conclusions of carelessness, rudeness,
inattention etc.

For example, my sister recently saw some of my mails and was mystified
that I had sent back 'blank mails' until I explained and pointed out
that my answers were interleaved into what was originally sent!
Clearly she had only ever seen (and therefore expected) top-posted
mail-threads.  Like your 'corporate-emailer' she found it damn neat,
after the initiation.

Whether such simple unfamiliarity with culture is the case in the
particular case (this thread's discussion) I am not sure.  Good to
remember Hanlon's razor...

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#27355

On Sat, 18 Aug 2012 10:27:10 -0700, rusi wrote:

> For example, my sister recently saw some of my mails and was mystified
> that I had sent back 'blank mails' until I explained and pointed out
> that my answers were interleaved into what was originally sent!

No offence to your sister, who I'm sure is probably a really great person 
and kind to small animals and furry children, but didn't she, you know, 
*investigate further* upon seeing something weird, namely a "blank" email?

As in, "Gosh, dearest brother has sent me an email without saying 
anything. That's weird. I hope he's alright? Maybe there's something a 
bit further down? Or a funny picture of a cat at the end? Or something? I 
better scroll down a bit further and see."

I'm not talking about "complicated tech stuff" like View > Message Source 
and trying to determine whether perhaps the MIME type is broken and 
there's an invisible attachment. I'm talking about almost the simplest 
thing in the friggin' world, *scrolling down and looking at what's there*.
The software equivalent of somebody handing you a "blank" piece of paper 
and turning it around to see if maybe there's something on the back.

Because that's what I do, and I don't think I'm some sort of hyper-
evolved mega-genius with a brain the size of a planet, I'm just some guy. 
Nobody needed to tell me "Hey dummy, the text you are looking for is a 
bit further down, keep reading." I just looked on my own, and saw the 
text on my own, and actually read it without being told to, and a little 
light bulb went on over my head and I went "Wow! People can actually 
write stuff in between other stuff! How did they do that?"

Now sure, I make allowances for 70 year olds who have never touched a 
computer before and have to ask "What's a scroll bar?" and "How do I use 
this mousey-pointer thing?" I assume your sister has minimal skills like 
"can scroll" and "knows how to read".

I'm not sure which is worse -- that perhaps I *am* some sort of mega-
genius and keep overestimating the difficulty of scroll-down-and-read for 
normal people, or that others have such short attention spans that 
anything that they can't see immediately in front of them might as well 
not exist. Either thought is rather depressing.



-- 
Steven

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#27358

On Sun, Aug 19, 2012 at 5:15 PM, Steven D'Aprano
<steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> wrote:
> The software equivalent of somebody handing you a "blank" piece of paper
> and turning it around to see if maybe there's something on the back.

Straight out of a Goon Show, that is. Heh.

ChrisA

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#27386

Hi Steve,

> I don't think I'm some sort of hyper-evolved mega-genius with a brain the size of a planet, I'm just some guy.

Based on reading thousands of your posts over the past 4 years, I'll
have to respectfully disagree with you on your assertion that you are
not some hyper-evolved genius with a brain the size of a planet. :)

I've learned a ton from reading your posts - so much so that I think my
brain is getting heavier[1].

Thank you and cheers!
Malcolm

>From a recent thread on this mailing list (hilarious)
http://onceuponatimeinindia.blogspot.in/2009/07/hard-drive-weight-increasing.html

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#27470

On Aug 19, 12:15 pm, Steven D'Aprano <steve
+comp.lang.pyt...@pearwood.info> wrote:
> is probably a really great person and kind to small animals and furry children, but...

ROFL!

The first we're all familiar with.

Furry children?

Something to do with heads the size of a planet?

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#27471

On Mon, Aug 20, 2012 at 5:31 PM, rusi <rustompmody@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Aug 19, 12:15 pm, Steven D'Aprano <steve
> +comp.lang.pyt...@pearwood.info> wrote:
>> is probably a really great person and kind to small animals and furry children, but...
>
> ROFL!
>
> The first we're all familiar with.
>
> Furry children?
>
> Something to do with heads the size of a planet?

Or it's a Wonka-esque "Wait. Scratch that. Reverse it" moment.

Of course Steven is a bit egotistical. That sort of happens when
you're better than 95% of the human population of this planet.

ChrisA

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#27475

On 20/08/2012 08:46, Chris Angelico wrote:
> On Mon, Aug 20, 2012 at 5:31 PM, rusi <rustompmody@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Aug 19, 12:15 pm, Steven D'Aprano <steve
>> +comp.lang.pyt...@pearwood.info> wrote:
>>> is probably a really great person and kind to small animals and furry children, but...
>>
>> ROFL!
>>
>> The first we're all familiar with.
>>
>> Furry children?
>>
>> Something to do with heads the size of a planet?
>
> Or it's a Wonka-esque "Wait. Scratch that. Reverse it" moment.
>
> Of course Steven is a bit egotistical. That sort of happens when
> you're better than 95% of the human population of this planet.
>
> ChrisA
>

He's a long way to go to catch up with me then :)

-- 
Cheers.

Mark Lawrence.

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#27227

   Hi.

> As a lurker, I agree completely with Chris's sentiments.

   +1

   Best regards,
     Jurko Gospodnetić

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#27551

On 2012/08/17 12:42 AM, Madison May wrote:

> As a lurker, I agree completely with Chris's sentiments.

I too, but I'd prefer something top-posted than have to skip through 38 
pages of quoted e-mail to get to a (generally) 1 liner at the bottom.

-- 
Regards
Alex

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#27557

On Tue, 21 Aug 2012 08:07:33 +0200, Alex Strickland wrote:

> On 2012/08/17 12:42 AM, Madison May wrote:
> 
>> As a lurker, I agree completely with Chris's sentiments.
> 
> I too, but I'd prefer something top-posted than have to skip through 38
> pages of quoted e-mail to get to a (generally) 1 liner at the bottom.

+1000

People with Hotmail accounts used to be known as "Metoobees" because of 
their tendency to reply to long posts with a single line at the very end, 
"Me too!".


-- 
Steven

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#27578

On Tue, 21 Aug 2012 08:07:33 +0200, Alex Strickland <sscc@mweb.co.za>
declaimed the following in gmane.comp.python.general:

> On 2012/08/17 12:42 AM, Madison May wrote:
> 
> > As a lurker, I agree completely with Chris's sentiments.
> 
> I too, but I'd prefer something top-posted than have to skip through 38 
> pages of quoted e-mail to get to a (generally) 1 liner at the bottom.

	Doesn't help me though... Agent shows quoted material as blue, fresh
text as black.

	I tend to not see a one-liner at the top (since it is next to the
attribution line) and if the rest of the page is all blue text I hit
page down... and down, down, down... looking for black text... Then end
up going "Wha', where's the new stuff?" and having to scroll back up to
find a one-liner cuddling up with the attribution line.
-- 
	Wulfraed                 Dennis Lee Bieber         AF6VN
        wlfraed@ix.netcom.com    HTTP://wlfraed.home.netcom.com/

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#27608

in 679182 20120821 181439 Dennis Lee Bieber <wlfraed@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>On Tue, 21 Aug 2012 08:07:33 +0200, Alex Strickland <sscc@mweb.co.za>
>declaimed the following in gmane.comp.python.general:
>
>> On 2012/08/17 12:42 AM, Madison May wrote:
>>
>> > As a lurker, I agree completely with Chris's sentiments.
>>
>> I too, but I'd prefer something top-posted than have to skip through 38
>> pages of quoted e-mail to get to a (generally) 1 liner at the bottom.
>
>Doesn't help me though... Agent shows quoted material as blue, fresh
>text as black.
>
>I tend to not see a one-liner at the top (since it is next to the
>attribution line) and if the rest of the page is all blue text I hit
>page down... and down, down, down... looking for black text... Then end
>up going "Wha', where's the new stuff?" and having to scroll back up to
>find a one-liner cuddling up with the attribution line.

Yep, and the only solution is for everyone to top-post.

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#27613

On 22/08/2012 07:25, Bob Martin wrote:
> in 679182 20120821 181439 Dennis Lee Bieber <wlfraed@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>> On Tue, 21 Aug 2012 08:07:33 +0200, Alex Strickland <sscc@mweb.co.za>
>> declaimed the following in gmane.comp.python.general:
>>
>>> On 2012/08/17 12:42 AM, Madison May wrote:
>>>
>>>> As a lurker, I agree completely with Chris's sentiments.
>>>
>>> I too, but I'd prefer something top-posted than have to skip through 38
>>> pages of quoted e-mail to get to a (generally) 1 liner at the bottom.
>>
>> Doesn't help me though... Agent shows quoted material as blue, fresh
>> text as black.
>>
>> I tend to not see a one-liner at the top (since it is next to the
>> attribution line) and if the rest of the page is all blue text I hit
>> page down... and down, down, down... looking for black text... Then end
>> up going "Wha', where's the new stuff?" and having to scroll back up to
>> find a one-liner cuddling up with the attribution line.
>
> Yep, and the only solution is for everyone to top-post.
>

The only solution is for people to use common sense.  At least one snag 
is that Voltaire said common sense is not so common.

-- 
Cheers.

Mark Lawrence.

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#27226

On Aug 17, 3:36 am, Chris Angelico <ros...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Fri, Aug 17, 2012 at 1:40 AM, Ramchandra Apte <maniandra...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > On 16 August 2012 21:00, Mark Lawrence <breamore...@yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
> >> and "bottom" reads better than "top"
>
> > Look you are the only person complaining about top-posting.
> > GMail uses top-posting by default.
> > I can't help it if you feel irritated by it.
>
> I post using gmail,

If you register on the mailing list as well as google groups, you can
then use googlegroups.
Thereafter appropriately cutting out the unnecessary stuff is easy

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#27236

On 2012-08-16, Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> wrote:
> On Fri, Aug 17, 2012 at 1:40 AM, Ramchandra Apte <maniandram01@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On 16 August 2012 21:00, Mark Lawrence <breamoreboy@yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
>>
>>> and "bottom" reads better than "top"
>>
>> Look you are the only person complaining about top-posting.

That may have been true -- in this thread -- so far.

>> GMail uses top-posting by default. I can't help it if you feel
>> irritated by it.

If you don't care whether or not people read your posts, go ahead and
top-post.  FWIW, you can make up your own private character encoding
and language and post in that if you want.  But, if your goal is to
communicate effectively with others, then proper formatting and
editing is A Good Thing(TM).

> I post using gmail, and I just delete two blank lines at the top and
> go down the bottom to type.
[...]
> And FWIW, I add my voice to those who prefer to read replies
> underneath the original text.

Same here.  I often skip reading top-posted articles entirely, since I
don't really care to take the time to start reading at the bottom,
working my up, trying to figure out exactly what the poster is
replying or referring to in the blob of context-free text at the top.

-- 
Grant Edwards               grant.b.edwards        Yow! I guess you guys got
                                  at               BIG MUSCLES from doing too
                              gmail.com            much STUDYING!

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#27285 — Re: Top-posting &c.

Grant Edwards <invalid@invalid.invalid> writes:

> On 2012-08-16, Chris Angelico <rosuav@gmail.com> wrote:
> > And FWIW, I add my voice to those who prefer to read replies
> > underneath the original text.
>
> Same here.  I often skip reading top-posted articles entirely, since I
> don't really care to take the time to start reading at the bottom,
> working my up, trying to figure out exactly what the poster is
> replying or referring to in the blob of context-free text at the top.

+1. A message which is top-posted is a fairly reliable indicator that
the message wasn't written with much consideration for the reader, so I
tend to just skip those messages.

If you don't care whether your messages are read, continue to top-post.

If you want to show that you've made efforts to make your message more
readable, use interleaved replies and trim off material to which you're
not replying <URL:http://brooksreview.net/2011/01/interleaved-email/>.

-- 
 \      “We tend to scoff at the beliefs of the ancients. But we can't |
  `\        scoff at them personally, to their faces, and this is what |
_o__)                                         annoys me.” —Jack Handey |
Ben Finney

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