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Posting Guidelines for CFS-20s
Quoting and Trimming
These Guidelines may not be copied, distributed or altered without the express
permission of its Author.
Hopefully the following 'fake' e-mail messages should not only explain how to quote and
trim messages correctly, and explain the reasons for doing so, but they should also show
quoting and trimming in action.
Original Post...
Hi All
I'm new to the net, and wondered if anyone could explain what is the best way to
reply to posts.
I've heard about quoting and trimming, but I am not sure what that means, or how
to go about doing it.
Yours
Fred
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First Reply...
Fred <fred@home.somewhere> wrote...
<snip>
>I've heard about quoting and trimming, but I
>am not sure what that means,
When you reply to someone's post, it is usual to quote some of the text from that
original text, so that people can see exactly what it is you are referring to. By
putting your reply under the bit of text you are replying to, it makes it much
easier for the reader to follow the "conversation".
To save space, you should trim any text that is not relevant to your reply, and
only leave in enough to keep your reply in context. If you cut out a large chunk
of text, it is best to insert a "<snip>" as it shows that you have
made a big cut.
>or how to go about doing it.
It sounds a lot more complicated than it is, especially as most e-mail software
will do most of the work for you.
When you reply to a post, your e-mail software should automatically add the quote
tags, to the beginning of each line of quoted text (usually a > symbol). Not
only do these symbols signify that the text that comes after them is a quote of a
previous message, but also most e-mail software will be able to show the text after
these symbols in a different colour, making it much easier for the reader to see
which parts of the text are quotes and which parts are your message.
Your software should also add some form of attribution. This is just a line at the
top of the post saying who was the author of the post you are replying to (like at
the top of this message where it says "Fred <fred@home.somewhere>
wrote...". This is to let everyone know exactly what message you are replying
to.
Now all you have to do, is add your own message below the part of the original
message you are replying to, and trim off any extraneous from the original text
that is no longer needed. It is always best to add your comments below the text
you are replying to, as it is more natural to read you comments after the original
text. Otherwise, people will read your message before knowing what it is you are
actually replying to. Unfortunately, for reasons best known to them, Microsoft's
Outlook Express automatically defaults to putting the reply above the original
message, so if you use this software, you'll have to take extra care to remember
to put your replies below the text, and not to leave the whole of the original
message tagged on to the end of your reply.
Finally, it is usually best to leave a blank line between the text you are replying
to, and your own comments. This should make it a lot clearer for those reading your
post, especially those with bad brainfog.
Hope that Helps
Roger
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Second Reply...
Roger <roger_pc@rbpc.demon.co.uk> wrote...
>Fred <fred@home.somewhere> wrote...
<snip>
>>or how to go about doing it.
>
>It sounds a lot more complicated than it is, especially
as
>most e-mail software will do most of the work for you.
It does sound a bit complicated but I think I get it.
<snip>
>Hope that Helps
It did, thanks. But if it's not a stupid question, why do we have to do these things, it seems
an awful lot of work.
Yours
Fred
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Third Reply...
Fred <fred@home.somewhere> wrote...
>Roger <roger_pc@rbpc.demon.co.uk> wrote...
>>Fred <fred@home.somewhere> wrote...
<snip>
>>It sounds a lot more complicated than it is, especially as
>> most e-mail software will do most of the work for you.
>
>It does sound a bit complicated but I think I get it.
Honestly, it is easy once you see it done a few times, it is just hard to explain
it in words. So please don't worry if you don't get it at first. just watch what a
couple of the old hands on the list do, and you will soon pick it up.
>>Hope that Helps
>
>It did, thanks. But if it's not a stupid question, why do
>we have to do these things, it seems an awful lot of work.
Well, the first and main reason is that by doing this, you make your posts a lot
easier to read. The reader doesn't have to trawl through lines of unnecessary text
to get to your reply, and by quoting correctly, it is easy to follow the flow of a
conversation, so anyone, even those who might not have read the previous posts in
a particular thread, can follow what is being said.
But there are also practical reasons for asking you to trim messages...
Many people on the list, have brainfog, so the easier it is for someone to read a
post, the more likely it is that your post will be read by everyone on the list.
Some people on the list receive the list in digest form, where they get all the
posts sent to the list in one day, in one long e-mail. Any extra text makes it
much harder for these people to find your reply.
Some members are so sick that they are not able to use the computer and have to
have the posts printed out, so any extra unnecessary text causes extra work for
them and their carers.
Some members have e-mail accounts which only allow a certain amount of storage
space for all their e-mails, so untrimmed e-mails can cause these accounts to
become overloaded and blocked. When this happens not only do these people not
receive all the list mail, but the bounced e-mails get sent back to the list and
cause errors which result in the person's e-mail address having to be set nomail
to prevent further problems.
Finally some members pay per the minute for on-line time so the downloading of
unnecessarily lengthy e-mail can end up costing them money.
Hope that helps. If it doesn't then you can always contact the
List Owner or one of the
Board of Directors, and we will be glad to help
you out.
Roger
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