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Re: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?

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  Re: How to improve my question in stackoverflow? Jim Popovitch <jim@k4vqc.com> - 2021-09-10 01:50 +0200
    HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?] <tomas@tuxteam.de> - 2021-09-10 08:50 +0200
      Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?] Pankaj Jangid <pankaj@codeisgreat.org> - 2021-09-10 11:40 +0200
        Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?] Joe <joe@jretrading.com> - 2021-09-10 13:40 +0200
        Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?] rhkramer@gmail.com - 2021-09-10 21:10 +0200
          Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?] <tomas@tuxteam.de> - 2021-09-10 22:20 +0200
      Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in          stackoverflow?] Linux-Fan <Ma_Sys.ma@web.de> - 2021-09-10 11:50 +0200
        Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?] <tomas@tuxteam.de> - 2021-09-10 16:20 +0200
      Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?] Jonathan Dowland <jon+debian-user@dow.land> - 2021-09-10 12:40 +0200
      Re: How to improve my question in stackoverflow? Greg Wooledge <greg@wooledge.org> - 2021-09-10 13:40 +0200
        Re: How to improve my question in stackoverflow? <tomas@tuxteam.de> - 2021-09-10 16:20 +0200
          Re: How to improve my question in stackoverflow? Joe <joe@jretrading.com> - 2021-09-10 16:50 +0200
      Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?] Charles Curley <charlescurley@charlescurley.com> - 2021-09-10 14:20 +0200
        Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?] Joe <joe@jretrading.com> - 2021-09-10 14:50 +0200
          Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?] rhkramer@gmail.com - 2021-09-10 21:30 +0200
            Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?] Joe <joe@jretrading.com> - 2021-09-12 08:50 +0200
        Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?] Curt <curty@free.fr> - 2021-09-10 16:50 +0200

#239815 — Re: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?

On Thu, 2021-09-09 at 16:27 -0600, William Torrez Corea wrote:
> Book.cpp:1:10: fatal error: Set: No existe el fichero o el directorio
> [closed]

First, most folks on tech mailinglists despise HTML email.

Second, let me help you help yourself.  Go to
https://www.debian.org/distrib/packages and near the bottom
of the page you can "Search the contents of packages". Select
for "packages that contain files named like this" and enter 
"set.h".  You will see a results page with a list of packages
that contain that file.

Now, if you tell us which version of Debian you are running
than someone here can tell you which version of libstdc++ 
you will need for set.h.

hth,

-Jim P.

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#239818 — HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?]

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On Thu, Sep 09, 2021 at 07:45:43PM -0400, Jim Popovitch wrote:

[...]

> First, most folks on tech mailinglists despise HTML email.

The original mail was a passable MIME multipart/alternative
with a plain text part. I /think/ that is OK, what do others
think?

Perhaps you can teach you mailer to pick the text part for
you :-)

(I'm just asking, because I've seen this complaint a couple
of times for a well-formed multipart message: personally, I'd
be OK with it, but I'd like to know how the consensus is).

Cheers
 - t

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#239823 — Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?]

<tomas@tuxteam.de> writes:

> (I'm just asking, because I've seen this complaint a couple
> of times for a well-formed multipart message: personally, I'd
> be OK with it, but I'd like to know how the consensus is).

I feel that it is okay now to send we formatted multipart messages. As
long as I am getting text parts (well-formatted), I have no problem.

-- 
Regards ~Pankaj

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#239828 — Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?]

On Fri, 10 Sep 2021 14:50:46 +0530
Pankaj Jangid <pankaj@codeisgreat.org> wrote:

> <tomas@tuxteam.de> writes:
> 
> > (I'm just asking, because I've seen this complaint a couple
> > of times for a well-formed multipart message: personally, I'd
> > be OK with it, but I'd like to know how the consensus is).  
> 
> I feel that it is okay now to send we formatted multipart messages. As



> long as I am getting text parts (well-formatted), I have no problem.
> 
I think that's the problem. I get many commercial emails that contain
text but are spread out so I have to scroll several pages to read about
ten lines, of which three have useful content. Also, hyperlinks are
usually absent, so if I want to see one (I don't use links in emails
from strangers) I need to pick through the html to find it.

-- 
Joe

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#239852 — Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?]

On Friday, September 10, 2021 05:20:46 AM Pankaj Jangid wrote:
> <tomas@tuxteam.de> writes:
> > (I'm just asking, because I've seen this complaint a couple
> > of times for a well-formed multipart message: personally, I'd
> > be OK with it, but I'd like to know how the consensus is).
> 
> I feel that it is okay now to send we formatted multipart messages. As
> long as I am getting text parts (well-formatted), I have no problem.

+1

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#239855 — Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?]

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On Fri, Sep 10, 2021 at 03:01:59PM -0400, rhkramer@gmail.com wrote:
> On Friday, September 10, 2021 05:20:46 AM Pankaj Jangid wrote:
> > <tomas@tuxteam.de> writes:
> > > (I'm just asking, because I've seen this complaint a couple
> > > of times for a well-formed multipart message: personally, I'd
> > > be OK with it, but I'd like to know how the consensus is).
> > 
> > I feel that it is okay now to send we formatted multipart messages. As
> > long as I am getting text parts (well-formatted), I have no problem.
> 
> +1

Yes, but as we have seen, some MUAs seem to do a miserable job when
building the plain text part from the HTML (like forgetting line-ends,
which wreaks havoc in source code). I didn't know that. This reduces
my tolerance for HTML mail even in the multipart case. The problem
there is that the sender is potentially seeing something different
from what the receiver is seeing, depending on the quality of the
sender's MUA.

Not amusing.

So multipart might be OK, but expect people trying to help you to
get very confused.

Cheers
 - t

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#239824 — Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?]

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tomas@tuxteam.de writes:

> On Thu, Sep 09, 2021 at 07:45:43PM -0400, Jim Popovitch wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> > First, most folks on tech mailinglists despise HTML email.
>
> The original mail was a passable MIME multipart/alternative
> with a plain text part. I /think/ that is OK, what do others
> think?

Postel's principle applies, hence: OK :)

> Perhaps you can teach you mailer to pick the text part for
> you :-)
>
> (I'm just asking, because I've seen this complaint a couple
> of times for a well-formed multipart message: personally, I'd
> be OK with it, but I'd like to know how the consensus is).

My mail client of choice (cone, not in Debian anymore) seems to prefer  
displaying the HTML part by default. It does this by converting it to a  
almost-text-only presentation retaining some things like bold and underline.  
It gets a little annoying with URLs because it displays link target and  
label which often leads to the same URL being displayed twice in the  
terminal.

AFAIK I cannot configure it to prefer the text version, but I have not  
checked that part of the source code to see how difficult it might be to  
implement such a choice. I can view both variants of the mail content on a  
case-by-case basis by opening them explicitly. This even works from inside  
the MUA, nice feature :) .

For my usage, it is easiest to have text-only e-mails because those always  
display nicely by default.

Additionally, in this C++ question thread, the source code was given in HTML  
and text parts of the e-mail and while the `#include` statements were all on  
separate lines in the HTML, they appear as one long line in the text part.  
IMHO it causes unnecessary confusion to have two slightly differently  
displayed parts of the same mail especially for questions with source code :)

Btw.: For C++ STL components such as `set` or `string` it is perfectly fine  
to not append a `.h`. In fact, it would seem not to be standards compliant  
to append the `.h`, cf. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/15680190

YMMV
Linux-Fan

öö

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#239837 — Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?]

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On Fri, Sep 10, 2021 at 11:41:55AM +0200, Linux-Fan wrote:
> tomas@tuxteam.de writes:

[...]

> Additionally, in this C++ question thread, the source code was given
> in HTML and text parts of the e-mail and while the `#include`
> statements were all on separate lines in the HTML, they appear as
> one long line in the text part.

So definitely one downside of posting HTML and hoping the mailer
comes up with a reasonable representation as text (I fell for it).

> Btw.: For C++ STL components such as `set` or `string` it is
> perfectly fine to not append a `.h`. In fact, it would seem not to
> be standards compliant to append the `.h`, cf.
> https://stackoverflow.com/questions/15680190

Thanks; Il Ka says the same downthread. I warned that I have
very little clue on C++. The problem seems to be that the
#include-d stuff is case-sensitive (i.e. "Set" instead of "set").

I defer to the C++ buffs here :)

Cheers
 - t

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#239826 — Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?]

On Fri, Sep 10, 2021 at 08:41:02AM +0200, tomas@tuxteam.de wrote:
>The original mail was a passable MIME multipart/alternative
>with a plain text part. I /think/ that is OK, what do others
>think?

I think that's perfectly reasonable. There /can/ be good reasons
for people to include a HTML part, including for reasons of
accessibility. As long as a legible text alternative is supplied,
I do not think it's reasonable to object to a HTML alternative.


-- 
Please do not CC me for listmail.

👱🏻	Jonathan Dowland
✎	 jmtd@debian.org
🔗	https://jmtd.net

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#239829

On Fri, Sep 10, 2021 at 08:41:02AM +0200, tomas@tuxteam.de wrote:
> The original mail was a passable MIME multipart/alternative
> with a plain text part. I /think/ that is OK, what do others
> think?

See below.

On Fri, Sep 10, 2021 at 08:25:05AM +0200, tomas@tuxteam.de wrote:
> On Thu, Sep 09, 2021 at 04:27:01PM -0600, William Torrez Corea wrote:
> > *Book.cpp*
> > 
> > #include <set>#include <map>#include <string>#include <map>#include
> > <fstream>#include <algorithm>using namespace std;
> 
> The line above looks very strange. Usually there is one #include
> directive per line. Something seems broken with your "book".

What's broken, I'm almost certain, is that this mega-line was
generated by a malformed HTML to text conversion.

In the general case, sure, it's not *terrible* if someone sends
multi-part text + HTML messages to the mailing list.  But this breaks
down in some cases, and causes the text part of the message to be
mangled.  Sometimes the readers will be able to discern this, and
figure out what the text was supposed to look like.  Other times, we
cannot.

So, the *best* thing to do would be to send plain text only.

The second best thing is to send mixed text and HTML, and try your
hardest to apply whatever heuristics and hacks you can think of to
make the text part as readable as possible.

The second-worst thing you can do is to send HTML only.

The absolute worst thing you can do is send HTML (with or without text)
and then act all arrogant and haughty, demanding that the entire
mailing list community conform to your personal whims.  (William did
not do this, as far as I know, but there was a recent poster who did.)

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#239836

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On Fri, Sep 10, 2021 at 07:32:28AM -0400, Greg Wooledge wrote:
> On Fri, Sep 10, 2021 at 08:41:02AM +0200, tomas@tuxteam.de wrote:
> > The original mail was a passable MIME multipart/alternative
> > with a plain text part. I /think/ that is OK, what do others
> > think?
> 
> See below.
> 
> On Fri, Sep 10, 2021 at 08:25:05AM +0200, tomas@tuxteam.de wrote:
> > On Thu, Sep 09, 2021 at 04:27:01PM -0600, William Torrez Corea wrote:
> > > *Book.cpp*
> > > 
> > > #include <set>#include <map>#include <string>#include <map>#include
> > > <fstream>#include <algorithm>using namespace std;
> > 
> > The line above looks very strange [...]

> What's broken, I'm almost certain, is that this mega-line was
> generated by a malformed HTML to text conversion.

Yes, confirmed upthread, thanks.

> In the general case, sure, it's not *terrible* if someone sends
> multi-part text + HTML messages to the mailing list.  But this breaks
> down in some cases, and causes the text part of the message to be
> mangled.  Sometimes the readers will be able to discern this, and
> figure out what the text was supposed to look like.  Other times, we
> cannot.
> 
> So, the *best* thing to do would be to send plain text only.

Definitely. This case is just evidence to that.

> The absolute worst thing you can do is send HTML (with or without text)
> and then act all arrogant and haughty [...]

Agreed. Arrogant and haughty is almost always wrong :-D

Cheers
 - t

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#239841

On Fri, 10 Sep 2021 16:17:29 +0200
<tomas@tuxteam.de> wrote:

> On Fri, Sep 10, 2021 at 07:32:28AM -0400, Greg Wooledge wrote:

> 
> > The absolute worst thing you can do is send HTML (with or without
> > text) and then act all arrogant and haughty [...]  
> 
> Agreed. Arrogant and haughty is almost always wrong :-D
>

Unless they are very rich, in which case they are merely eccentric.

-- 
Joe

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#239830 — Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?]

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On Fri, 10 Sep 2021 08:41:02 +0200
<tomas@tuxteam.de> wrote:

> (I'm just asking, because I've seen this complaint a couple
> of times for a well-formed multipart message: personally, I'd
> be OK with it, but I'd like to know how the consensus is).

I think it has problems. One case is where the author composes in HTML,
and uses colors, emphasis, etc. to make his points, and those are
stripped out of the plain text version, thereby distorting the author's
intent.

(I also think that if one must use colors, emphasis, etc. as part of
one's writing, then one is not a very good writer. On the other
tentacle, one should not expect good writing from nerds.)

-- 
Does anybody read signatures any more?

https://charlescurley.com
https://charlescurley.com/blog/

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#239832 — Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?]

On Fri, 10 Sep 2021 06:15:12 -0600
Charles Curley <charlescurley@charlescurley.com> wrote:

> On Fri, 10 Sep 2021 08:41:02 +0200
> <tomas@tuxteam.de> wrote:
> 
> > (I'm just asking, because I've seen this complaint a couple
> > of times for a well-formed multipart message: personally, I'd
> > be OK with it, but I'd like to know how the consensus is).  
> 
> I think it has problems. One case is where the author composes in
> HTML, and uses colors, emphasis, etc. to make his points, and those
> are stripped out of the plain text version, thereby distorting the
> author's intent.
> 
> (I also think that if one must use colors, emphasis, etc. as part of
> one's writing, then one is not a very good writer. On the other
> tentacle, one should not expect good writing from nerds.)
> 

Do it in DTP and attach it, if you must. I decide whether to read it.

Sadly, much html comes of of MS software, and takes about ten pages of
markup to include three text lines.

-- 
Joe

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#239853 — Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?]

On Friday, September 10, 2021 08:45:19 AM Joe wrote:
> Sadly, much html comes of of MS software, and takes about ten pages of
> markup to include three text lines.

That may be (or may be a slight exxageration ;-), but in my email client, if I 
get a multipart message, the plain text part is displayed and I see the 3 
lines of text -- I don't see the 10 pages of markup.

Do you see the ~10 pages of markup?

I use an older version of kmail (1.13.7 for kde 4.8.4) and I thought I had to 
set two relevant options, one to choose to display the plain text part of a 
multipart message, and the 2nd (less relevant) to choose to compose emails 
(and replies) in plain text, but, atm, I can't find either of those options.

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#239893 — Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?]

On Fri, 10 Sep 2021 15:22:30 -0400
rhkramer@gmail.com wrote:

> On Friday, September 10, 2021 08:45:19 AM Joe wrote:
> > Sadly, much html comes of of MS software, and takes about ten pages
> > of markup to include three text lines.  
> 
> That may be (or may be a slight exxageration ;-), but in my email
> client, if I get a multipart message, the plain text part is
> displayed and I see the 3 lines of text -- I don't see the 10 pages
> of markup.
> 
> Do you see the ~10 pages of markup?

If I need to pick through the html to find something missing from the
text, but very often those who use Word as an html email client have
never heard of the concept of alternate text.

-- 
Joe

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#239840 — Re: HTML mail [was: How to improve my question in stackoverflow?]

On 2021-09-10, Charles Curley <charlescurley@charlescurley.com> wrote:

> (I also think that if one must use colors, emphasis, etc. as part of
> one's writing, then one is not a very good writer. On the other
> tentacle, one should not expect good writing from nerds.)
>

I think there was at least one book--or article or series of articles or
maybe even a whole *period* (it was a *style*)--where Tom Wolfe (not the
one who went home but found he actually couldn't but the other one)
repeatedly used multiple exclamation points at the end of sentences (as
well as italics frequently for emphasis).  Maybe the exception that
proves your rule.

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