[mythtvnz] Bottom Posting to HTML posts?

[Steve Hodge]

On Sun, Oct 3, 2010 at 6:04 PM, Robin Gilks <g8ecj at gilks.org> wrote:

>
> > On Sun, Oct 3, 2010 at 3:00 PM, Nick Rout <nick.rout at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> On Sun, Oct 3, 2010 at 1:47 PM, Tortise <tortise at paradise.net.nz>
> wrote:
> >> > Can someone enlighten me how one sensibly and easily bottom posts in
> >> reply to HTML posts which do not use the "<" conventions?
> >> > (e.g. Steves last post.)  Is there a trick, or does one edit edit...?
> >>
> >>
> >> If everyone posted plain text the problem would disappear.
> >>
> >
> > If eveyone used a modern mail client the problem would disappear as well
> > :-)
> >
>
> Email was and is designed for plain text - mailing lists were and are
> designed for plain text. The fact that an attachment can be made to an
> email that duplicates the information (but bloated) doesn't mean the
> facility should be used.
>

The fact the email was designed before HTML caught on isn't really that
relevant IMHO. Lots of standards get upgraded. MIME has been around for
something like 15 years - might be time to get on board!

HTML encoded email supports the character sets necessary to properly use
both our official written languages - a public mailing list run in this
country really should accept it for that reason alone. HTML email also
handles quoting better. It doesn't result in misquoted text like this:
>> > Can someone enlighten me how one sensibly and easily bottom posts in
>> reply to HTML posts which do not use the "<" conventions?

Btw, multipart/alternative and multipart/mixed are not the same thing - the
HTML is not an attachment. And the only reason email is still bloated with
plain text versions is to support luddites who stubbornly refuse to upgrade
;-)


> Stripping out the garbage for archiving is also a real pain - one of the
> reasons mailman can be so fragile these days.
>

 If you can't gracefully handle HTML email in 2010 the problem is yours.
It's not hard to handle.


> Why anyone would want to put any fancy formatting into an email that
> requires html beats me. Its like top posting - its just wrong!


Top/bottom posting is a different sort of issue entirely. It's about writing
for maximum ease of understanding, just like all other grammer and
punctuation rules and conventions.

Cheers,
Steve
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