Posting question...

Benjamin Lewis <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Carl Fogel said:

Dear David,

Are you aware that this is what shows up as your "References:" line, at least as shown under
Google's original format display?

<[email hidden]> <[email hidden]>
<[email hidden]>
<[email hidden]>

I speculate that this is next to useless for ordinary purposes when compared to:

Re: Posting question...

Not at all; this is completely insufficient to restore the tree-structure of a thread, and makes
it difficult to figure who is responding to whom.

Imagine downloading a thread for the first time, and seeing one original post, and 100 responses,
all sorted randomly.

Dear Benjamin,

No need to imagine (except the random part), since I do it daily. It's quite easy to see who is
responding to whom on the Google tree, although when David and Shayne get into their endless pissing
matches it tends to indent off the right-hand side of the screen. (Wouldn't it be nice if they'd
start a new thread and get a room, so to speak?)

Possibly I'm spoiled by a fast cable connection, since you speak of "downloading" a thread--I just
pick and choose with happy and almost instant abandon from Google's indented tree structure, after
first choosing a subject from the most recently active. about two dozen per page, less than a second
to move to the next page, and archives stretching back to 1995. There's no "downloading" time, if
that's what you meant.

Whenever I can't remember where some deathless prose is, I fill out the search field, find that
"tall-boy" does not appear in the group, scratch my head, try "tallbike," and voila, there's Chalo
and the post with the details that I needed in order to post some pictures.

I must confess that I may have missed your actual point, since "Not at all; this is completely
insufficient . . ." may not have been quite what you meant.

The "Not at all" seems to refer to my unkind "completely useless" remark, but then what would the
"completely insufficient" on the far side of the semi-colon refer to?

I often get tangled up in the hurly-burly, so this is no criticism, just a long-winded way of asking
what you meant to say--I don't want to misunderstand what you're saying about which newsreader's
tree structure.

Carl Fogel

Benjamin Lewis <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Carl Fogel said:

And remember to make your Web page appeal to a somewhat broader audience than the users of the
trn3 newsreader on linux systems--it's undoubtedly a fine program on an excellent operating
system, but it's also perhaps just a touch insular in that it appeals to a somewhat smaller
computer-mad audience. (Possibly that's why it doesn't show up in the statistics of who uses
what here.)

There are plenty of other decent newsreaders available for various operating systems which handle
threading properly. I see no compelling reason to break the behaviour of a web-based reader. If
you send a response to an article, it should appear as a response to that article, even if you
change the subject to indicate topic-drift. This is intuitive behaviour, not some crazy madness
that unix freaks have dreamed up.

Dear Benjamin,

Some of us Unix freaks resent being lumped in with us Linux freaks, who resent being lumped in
with us Windows freaks, who resent us Pick freaks, who haven't seen much lately of us MS-DOS
freaks, who won't speak to us Mac freaks, who helped bury us CP/M freaks. (Some days I don't know
which hat to wear.)

Whatever operating system is involved, it always startles me how some people feel that the subject
of a thread is theirs to determine--damn the previous seven hundred clueless fools who sheep-like
pursued the matter as "Should I Wear Underwear?"

Since they're determined to announce a new topic, why not strike out boldly and simply start a new
thread? (Either way is fine with me.)

Carl Fogel

Carl Fogel <[email hidden]> wrote:
: Some of us Unix freaks resent being lumped in with us Linux freaks,

it's true. one reason for that is all the weird linux people keep trying to make UNIX(tm) look like
WinDoze. sheesh, i was happy with sunview.

lucky for us BSD folks SCO doesn't care and they'll be coming after us in 2005.

.. hahaha. as if there'll be a 2005 for SCO.

then again, my USENET predictions are infamously bad. if you were to look hard enough you'd find a
classic on alt.tv.x-files where i predict the show's demise in its first season.

ooops.
--
david reuteler [email hidden]

Quoted message said:

Some of us Unix freaks resent being lumped in with us Linux freaks, who resent being lumped in
with us Windows freaks, who resent us Pick freaks, who haven't seen much lately of us MS-DOS
freaks, who won't speak to us Mac freaks, who helped bury us CP/M freaks. (Some days I don't know
which hat to wear.)

"...so on, and so on, and shooby-dooby doo-on." ?

Carl Fogel said:

David Damerell <[email hidden]>:

Quoted message said:

Are you aware that every article contains a References: line, a list of its parent articles up the
thread? Hence there is no need to speculate about whether a new subject represents a new thread.

Are you aware that this is what shows up as your "References:" line, at least as shown under
Google's original format display?
<[email hidden]> <[email hidden]>
<[email hidden]>
<[email hidden]>

Yes, of course I am. I have been familiar with the format of References lines for roughly a decade.

Quoted message said:

I speculate that this is next to useless for ordinary purposes when compared to: Re: Posting
question...

Just once in a while, will you _please_ consider the possibility that I know what I'm talking about,
and you don't? It's getting rather tiresome.

The "ordinary purpose" here is automated sorting of articles, whether one reads via Google or almost
any newsreader. The References line is enormously more useful for that purpose.

Quoted message said:

When you put up your Web page, do try to remember that most of us are interested in the brakes, the
gas pedal, and the steering wheel because we want to get somewhere, not in the precise shape of the
piston rings.

That's all very well, but you should then refrain from telling competent motor mechanics how the
engine works!

Quoted message said:

the trn3 newsreader on linux systems--it's smaller computer-mad audience. (Possibly that's why it
doesn't show up in the statistics of who uses what here.)

As has been explained to you once already, not all newsreaders advertise themselves in the
posting headers.
--
David Damerell <[email hidden]> Distortion Field!

Carl Fogel said:

Benjamin Lewis <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:<[email hidden]>...

[Carl wants "sort by subject" alone - actually he doesn't, but as ever his understanding is limited]

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Not at all; this is completely insufficient to restore the tree-structure of a thread, and makes
it difficult to figure who is responding to whom. Imagine downloading a thread for the first time,
and seeing one original post, and 100 responses, all sorted randomly.

No need to imagine (except the random part), since I do it daily.

No, you don't. Please refrain from telling nonsense to people who know what they are talking about.
Where the articles in a thread share a common Subject line, Google presents the thread tree as
deduced from the References: lines.
--
David Damerell <[email hidden]> Distortion Field!

Carl Fogel said:

Whatever operating system is involved, it always startles me how some people feel that the subject
of a thread is theirs to determine--

However, that manifestly is the case, and indeed it is best practice to change the Subject line
when topic drift occurs within a thread; a practice that many people (myself included) often are
rather slack at.
--
David Damerell <[email hidden]> Distortion Field!

Rick Onanian said:

Quoted message said:

How do you decide what a "minor modification" is?

My point wasn't the severity of the modification of the subject line; it was that the content
continued on the same topic.

Well, I don't think that's right at all. Topic drift can often take threads in wildly different
directions; the inter-article relationships are still useful.

Now, if somone just wants to change the subject (not the Subject), they should start a new thread;
but if they want to respond to a side point in a previous posting, they should preserve the
relationship between that article and that prior one.
--
David Damerell <[email hidden]> Distortion Field!

Carl Fogel said:

Benjamin Lewis said:

Not at all; this is completely insufficient to restore the tree-structure of a thread, and makes
it difficult to figure who is responding to whom.

Imagine downloading a thread for the first time, and seeing one original post, and 100 responses,
all sorted randomly.

Dear Benjamin,

No need to imagine (except the random part), since I do it daily. It's quite easy to see who is
responding to whom on the Google tree,

That's because the Google tree is built using the References: headers (for the most part; from what
has been said here, it's partly broken, and I'm whining about that.) If Google only used the subject
line, you would see the parent article, followed by all the responses sorted randomly, and you'd end
up reading responses to responses to responses before you read the responses to responses themselves
. . . it would be madness!

Quoted message said:

Possibly I'm spoiled by a fast cable connection, since you speak of "downloading" a thread--I just
pick and choose with happy and almost instant abandon from Google's indented tree structure, after
first choosing a subject from the most recently active. about two dozen per page, less than a
second to move to the next page, and archives stretching back to 1995. There's no "downloading"
time, if that's what you meant.

That's not what I meant. My connection is nice and zippy.

Quoted message said:

Whenever I can't remember where some deathless prose is, I fill out the search field, find that
"tall-boy" does not appear in the group, scratch my head, try "tallbike," and voila, there's Chalo
and the post with the details that I needed in order to post some pictures.

I agree that the subject line is often more useful for searching purposes than the references
headers, but this is another issue.

Quoted message said:

I must confess that I may have missed your actual point, since "Not at all; this is completely
insufficient . . ." may not have been quite what you meant.

The "Not at all" seems to refer to my unkind "completely useless" remark, but then what would the
"completely insufficient" on the far side of the semi-colon refer to?

"Completely insufficient" referred to attempting to restore the tree structure of a thread using the
"subject:" header. The subject header gives no information about what article is a parent of what
other article.

--
Benjamin Lewis

"Love is a snowmobile racing across the tundra and then suddenly it flips over, pinning you
underneath. At night, the ice weasels come." --Matt Groening

David Damerell <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Carl Fogel said:

David Damerell <[email hidden]>:

Quoted message said:

Are you aware that every article contains a References: line, a list of its parent articles up
the thread? Hence there is no need to speculate about whether a new subject represents a new
thread.

Are you aware that this is what shows up as your "References:" line, at least as shown under
Google's original format display?
<[email hidden]> <[email hidden]>
<[email hidden]>
<[email hidden]>

Yes, of course I am. I have been familiar with the format of References lines for roughly
a decade.

Quoted message said:

I speculate that this is next to useless for ordinary purposes when compared to: Re: Posting
question...

Just once in a while, will you _please_ consider the possibility that I know what I'm talking
about, and you don't? It's getting rather tiresome.

The "ordinary purpose" here is automated sorting of articles, whether one reads via Google or
almost any newsreader. The References line is enormously more useful for that purpose.

Quoted message said:

When you put up your Web page, do try to remember that most of us are interested in the brakes,
the gas pedal, and the steering wheel because we want to get somewhere, not in the precise shape
of the piston rings.

That's all very well, but you should then refrain from telling competent motor mechanics how the
engine works!

Quoted message said:

the trn3 newsreader on linux systems--it's smaller computer-mad audience. (Possibly that's why it
doesn't show up in the statistics of who uses what here.)

As has been explained to you once already, not all newsreaders advertise themselves in the posting
headers.

Dear David,

As a remote possibility, perhaps.

As you might have noticed, previous posts suggested that interested parties still couldn't find many
trn3 users.

Carl Fogel

On 19 Nov 2003 15:29:08 -0800, [email hidden] (Carl Fogel) wrote: <snip>

Quoted message said:

who helped bury us CP/M freaks. (Some days I

<snip>

Quoted message said:

the matter as "Should I Wear Underwear?"

Should I wear underwear while I reminisce about the C-battery powered CP/M laptop with NVRAM for
storage and ROM cartridges for programs? Alas, it met it's death in my backpack in high school
biology class, scant months after being unearthed by a teacher who wanted to encourage the geek with
the fr0...

Quoted message said:

Since they're determined to announce a new topic, why not strike out boldly and simply start a new
thread? (Either way is fine with me.)

I will not announce a new topic OR start a new thread! I will discuss completely off-topic stuff
such as reminiscence underwearing within the ill-fitting context of an off-topic thread in a bicycle
tech newsfroup.

Quoted message said:

Carl Fogel

--
Rick Onanian

Adam Rush <[email hidden]> wrote:
: "...so on, and so on, and shooby-dooby doo-on." ?

& if it weren't so damn fun maybe we'd stop.
--
david reuteler [email hidden]

Carl Fogel said:

David Damerell said:

As has been explained to you once already, not all newsreaders advertise themselves in the posting
headers.

As a remote possibility, perhaps.

Of course if you'd QUOTE PROPERLY I'd know what part of my article this was a reply to.

Assuming it's to the last 2 lines, quoted above, it is not a remote possibility at all. It's a fact.

Quoted message said:

As you might have noticed, previous posts suggested that interested parties still couldn't find
many trn3 users.

Even if this is true it is not relevant. The workings of news servers are identical whichever
newsreader is used. The only newsreader-specific part of such a document would be explaining the
various ways in which newsreaders try and fool people into misconceptions about the underlying
facts; since I've already dispelled several such instilled into you by Google, I think you can
assume I am competent to write about such things.
--
David Damerell <[email hidden]> flcl?

David Damerell <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:<[email hidden]>...

Quoted message said:

Carl Fogel said:

David Damerell said:

As has been explained to you once already, not all newsreaders advertise themselves in the
posting headers.

As a remote possibility, perhaps.

Of course if you'd QUOTE PROPERLY I'd know what part of my article this was a reply to.

Assuming it's to the last 2 lines, quoted above, it is not a remote possibility at all.
It's a fact.

Quoted message said:

As you might have noticed, previous posts suggested that interested parties still couldn't find
many trn3 users.

Even if this is true it is not relevant. The workings of news servers are identical whichever
newsreader is used. The only newsreader-specific part of such a document would be explaining the
various ways in which newsreaders try and fool people into misconceptions about the underlying
facts; since I've already dispelled several such instilled into you by Google, I think you can
assume I am competent to write about such things.

Dear David,

A few moments re-reading your completely quoted nonsense might have saved you some embarrassment.

But since you're a bit slow, here it is, spelled out. Do let me know if you need the syllables
properly estranged for easier pronunciation.

David Damerell:

Quoted message said:

Just once in a while, will you _please_ consider the possibility that I know what I'm talking
about . . .

Carl Fogel:

Quoted message said:

As a remote possibility, perhaps.

It was, after all, the only place in your somewhat whiny followup where "possibility" appeared. Feel
free to favor us with extended remarks explaining precisely how wide lines should be, as well as
what you will and will not tolerate in subject lines, "quoting," and other matters of deep interest.

Perhaps Shayne will reply?

Off to play with the grown-ups.

Carl Fogel

Carl Fogel said:

David Damerell:

Quoted message said:

Just once in a while, will you _please_ consider the possibility that I know what I'm talking
about . . .

Carl Fogel:

Quoted message said:

As a remote possibility, perhaps.

Oh, I see. Well, that's absurd. I've done you the service of making considerable inroads into your
vast vista of ignorance, and all you can do is be snide about it?

Get someone else to throw clues in your direction. I'm finished.
--
David Damerell <[email hidden]> Distortion Field!

David Damerell said:

Carl Fogel said:

David Damerell:

Quoted message said:

Just once in a while, will you _please_ consider the possibility that I know what I'm talking
about . . .

resort to authority (logical fallacy)

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Carl Fogel:

Quoted message said:

As a remote possibility, perhaps.

Quoted message said:

Oh, I see. Well, that's absurd.

No it's not. Look up absurdity. He actually indulged your fallacy a bit, in an attempt to humor you.

Quoted message said:

I've done you the service of making considerable inroads into your vast vista of ignorance, and
all you can do is be snide about it?

Get someone else to throw clues in your direction. I'm finished.

Braaakabrakabraka (that's the sound of a chicken). You couldn't back up your claims, so now you're
gonna throw out some petty insults and run away. I can see the tail feathers twitching in
indignation.

Jay Hill said:

Braaakabrakabraka (that's the sound of a chicken). You couldn't back up your claims,

Perhaps you would care to identify which of my claims about the operation of Usenet are incorrect?

Perhaps you wouldn't; because you can't, because every damn thing I've said about it has been right.
--
David Damerell <[email hidden]> flcl?