Top-posting (was: Barracuda Networks is at it again: Any Suggestions as to anAlternative? )

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1

From: "Michael Painter" <tvhawaii@shaka.com>
Date: Sun, 10 Apr 2011 23:11:44 -1000

gord wrote:
> I wonder if there's a filter for top-postings in list that have a
> bottom-posting rule?
> This thread is very operationally interesting to me but I've lost the
> plot :frowning:
>
> http://www.nanog.org/mailinglist/listfaqs/generalfaq.php?qt=convent
> refers.
>
> PS: I know that some devices actually prevent bottom-posting by default.
> Workarounds are possible and are evident in other recent posts to this
> list.
> Additionally, may I suggest you file a bug report with your vendors or
> switch to a device that you can control properly :slight_smile:

It makes the thread very hard to follow.
> Why not?
>> Please don't top post!

I used to have this available for a 'signature', but, with a few exceptions, it seems to fall on blind eyes these
days.<sigh>

I put nearly identical text in response to top-posted messages and, if
it was not too difficult, move the top-posted response to the end, before
my response.

Of late I have started to get responses from people (not even the person
who top-posted) saying that I should f*** off and that they would post
however they wanted. Very hostile and even threatening.

I even manage to bottom post from my iPod. With cut and paste, it's
really not hard, but I guess it's just beyond the capacities of some
and somehow offensive to others.

**Sigh**

2

My wife complained once that my responses are hard to read and that I
should "just put at the top like the rest of the Internet." I fear I
have been passed by...

3

It's really impressive how insular a bunch of old timers can be.

Coming up next: rants about HTML mail!

R's,
John

In article <BANLkTi=v11TghFGmxStjxscJTGpB6CTwUQ@mail.gmail.com> you write:

4

Standard threaded (IE: not top-posted) replies have been the standard for
technical mailing lists on the net since I first joined one.

In 1983.

Anyone who has a problem with it can, in short, go bugger off. Really.

(And like you, Keith, because my current MUA, Zimbra, is moronic, I too
have to rethread myself by hand, quite a lot of the time. And I do it,
because -- like you -- I believe in The Commons)

Cheers,
-- jra

5

I never thought I'd say this about John, but PDFTT, folks. :slight_smile:

Cheers,
-- jra

6

--As of April 11, 2011 3:11:15 PM -0400, Jay Ashworth is alleged to have said:

Of late I have started to get responses from people (not even the person
who top-posted) saying that I should f*** off and that they would post
however they wanted. Very hostile and even threatening.

I even manage to bottom post from my iPod. With cut and paste, it's
really not hard, but I guess it's just beyond the capacities of some
and somehow offensive to others.

Standard threaded (IE: not top-posted) replies have been the standard for
technical mailing lists on the net since I first joined one.

In 1983.

Anyone who has a problem with it can, in short, go bugger off. Really.

--As for the rest, it is mine.

I've found my mail has fallen into three basic categories over time:

1) Mailing list, technical or otherwise.

2) Personal discussions.

3) 'Official' work email, of one form or another.

Of the three, #1 almost always is either bottom posted, or fully intermixed. #2 I often introduce people to the idea, but once they get it they like it. In both of these it is more important what is replying to what, and what the *current state* of the conversation is. Either one I can rely on the other participants to have the history (or at least have access to it). Top-posting in either context is non-helpful.

#3, is always top-posted, and I've grown to like that in that context. The most current post serves as a 'this is where we are right now, and what needs to be done', while the rest tends to preserve the *entire* history, including any parts I was not a part of initially. (For instance: A user sends an email to their boss, who emails the helpdesk, who emails back for clarification, and then forwards on that reply to me. At that point it's often nice to know what the original issue was, or to be able to reach the user directly instead of through several layers of intermediary.)

It has different strengths and weaknesses, and can be useful in it's place. Mailing lists are not top-posting's place. :wink:

Daniel T. Staal

(As for HTML email... I've yet to meet an actual human who routinely used HTML-only emails. They are a sure sign of a marketing department's involvement.)

7

From: "Daniel Staal" <DStaal@usa.net>

--As of April 11, 2011 3:11:15 PM -0400, Jay Ashworth is alleged to
have said:

Nope; I really said it. :slight_smile:

> Standard threaded (IE: not top-posted) replies have been the standard for
> technical mailing lists on the net since I first joined one.
>
> In 1983.

Footnote: Maybe that was more Usenet, that early. :slight_smile:

> Anyone who has a problem with it can, in short, go bugger off.
> Really.

--As for the rest, it is mine.

I've found my mail has fallen into three basic categories over time:

1) Mailing list, technical or otherwise.
2) Personal discussions.
3) 'Official' work email, of one form or another.

Of the three, #1 almost always is either bottom posted, or fully
intermixed. #2 I often introduce people to the idea, but once they get
it they like it. In both of these it is more important what is replying
to what, and what the *current state* of the conversation is. Either one
I can rely on the other participants to have the history (or at least
have access to it). Top-posting in either context is non-helpful.

Well put.

#3, is always top-posted, and I've grown to like that in that context.
The most current post serves as a 'this is where we are right now, and
what needs to be done', while the rest tends to preserve the *entire*
history, including any parts I was not a part of initially. (For instance: A
user sends an email to their boss, who emails the helpdesk, who emails back
for clarification, and then forwards on that reply to me. At that point
it's often nice to know what the original issue was, or to be able to reach
the user directly instead of through several layers of intermediary.)

I sorely hate to admit it, but you're right. I tried doing traditional
quoting on emails in my last position (as IT director in a call center),
and everyone else's heads came off and rolled around on the floor; my boss,
the controller, actually *asked me to stop*.

It has different strengths and weaknesses, and can be useful in it's
place. Mailing lists are not top-posting's place. :wink:

We clearly agree, here. Hopefully, we've clarified the reasons why,
for anyone who was on the fence.

(As for HTML email... I've yet to meet an actual human who routinely
used HTML-only emails. They are a sure sign of a marketing department's
involvement.)

I have. No, not necessarily.

Cheers,
-- jra

8

interleaved posting is considered harmful.

/bill

9

Too many Outlook users. With just about any other email client it is
very easy to bottom post.
  To those who wish to post as they want demonstrates a certain something
about being a professional and an additional personality component that
need not be mentioned.
  Richard Golodner

10

Vern Schryver once pointed out that a multipart/alternative with a
text/plain and text/html was *always* incorrect - if the semantic content
was the same, the html coipy was superfluous and shouldn't have been
sent, and if the semantic content was different because the html added
to it, the text/plain was therefor misleading and shouldn't have been sent.

11

The issue with outlook/exchange is there is no way to use another client with
it. I cannot even force plain text to the internet, the server send it as
quoted printable even if I strip all formatting.

The outlook email client does not support wrapping text at a given line length
either.

12

Ewe bad memmories. Can we clean up our language on this list a bit.
Throwing words out like Exchange and Outlook make my teeth grind.

Thanks for considering my request.

13

The issue with outlook/exchange is there is no way to use another client with
it. I cannot even force plain text to the internet, the server send it as
quoted printable even if I strip all formatting.

If the entire body part is expressible in US-ASCII, then the case can be made
that using quoted-printable *anyhow* is a bug because it's using an
un-necessary encoding..

The outlook email client does not support wrapping text at a given line length
either.

Except for RFC2045, section 6.7, which addresses this:

                                                                             A body which is
   entirely US-ASCII may also be encoded in Quoted-Printable to ensure
   the integrity of the data should the message pass through a
   character-translating, and/or line-wrapping gateway.

In other words, "since we can't wrap at anyplace sane, we're worried that a
line pretending to be a paragraph will hit the 998-octet SMTP linelength
limit."

14

I sincerely

interleaved posting is considered harmful.

Disagree.

Owen

15

  Too many Outlook users. With just about any other email client it is
very easy to bottom post.
  To those who wish to post as they want demonstrates a certain something
about being a professional and an additional personality component that
need not be mentioned.

The issue with outlook/exchange is there is no way to use another client with
it. I cannot even force plain text to the internet, the server send it as
quoted printable even if I strip all formatting.

I have used Evolution and IMAP with exchange servers in the past, so, I'm not
convinced this is an entirely accurate statement.

The outlook email client does not support wrapping text at a given line length
either.

I'll skip the obvious conclusion about the quality of the product in question.

Owen

16

And in fact, I'm posting this message in plain-text via the OSX Mail.app connected via native Exchange protocols to an Exchange server.

There's even a plug-in for Mail.app in order to make inline posting easier.

17

I am top-posting to show that this entire thread is retarded.

I certainly could have bottom-posted, because I don't use Outlook for
this list, but the point here is -- is this what the NANOG list has
really become? Really?

So sad.

- ferg

18

Call me and old 'hard case' - but I prefer that when I get information via email, that if possible, the relevant information show up immediately.

Call me lazy I guess - but I would expect that most folks on this list have also understood good user interface design, and that the least amount of work that needs to be done for the receiver to be able to get their information is frequently the best solution.

On the other hand - I must admit that I do often top post and note 'see inline' with heavy use of snipping in order to shorten what has turned into a long topic in order to make it a shorter and more concise topic.

I absolutely agree with anybody (or everybody), that wants mailing list archives to be readable. Fortunately we have things called 'computers' that do that quite well - and reorganize the email correspondence on mailing lists back into standard chronological order.

I am also not adverse to changing formats - I just think that it is just inefficient.

- mike

19

Hi Paul,

Your point is taken - but actually this is a bit of a conundrum, at least for me.

Generally what I see is that younger people who grew up using email when they were children desire to bottom post or post inline whereas folks that originally utilized email primarily to communicate technical information only generally prefer to top-post.

I believe that top-posting is fine and that have also found use for (what do they call it, reverse-hugarian or reverse-polish) notation for doing things like naming and structuring software packages to also be immensely useful.

Either way, I ultimately agree with you - except with the possible exception that possibly if the NaNog list really care - they could setup a survey of all list members, have everybody vote, then we know on this list that when we ask questions where we expect timely answers we can expect the answers to possibly be buried in a myriad of text. Another problem with bottom-posting is the <SNIP> of anything above, etc.

Cheers - and sorry for having a little late night fun bothering everybody with noting something that I have seen mostly as a social change on how people communicate via email over the past 30 years.

- Mike

P.S. - meanwhile, for an email list like NaNog - I am still hoping that most folks want efficiency on answers to questions - and if the need old data are clever enough to realize that there are plenty of ways via HTTP to find those 'weirdo top-post commentors' listed with their posts in chronological and/or relevance level - with prior commentary properly sorted.
- mfd

20

Well indeed, top-posting is just so much more efficient given the volumes of email most of us probably see each day.

Back when receiving an email was an event, and your xbiff flag popping up was a cause for excitement, taking time to scroll/page down to the new bottom-posted content in the reply was part of the enjoyment of the whole 'You have new mail' process. But I'm afraid times have changed; bottom-posted email is now an annoyance to most just as a slow-loading web page would be.

Tim