Re: Message formatting

Folkert Rienstra wrote:
Michael Baeuerle wrote in message news:nfe1q4-ac1.ln1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Folkert Rienstra wrote:
"Michael Baeuerle" wrote in message news:vl60q4-uuk.ln1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx:


I can offer you this style.

Which is option 4 in the Thunderbird mailnews file that you refused to use.

Damn it! Now you want to join the trolls.
Again: I don't use Thunderbird and don't have a mailnews.js file. Must I
prove it by giving you remote access before you believe me?

[...]
You assume that all people use the same equipment as you do.

Yeah, weird huh.

No comment.

Many Unix users still use textmode newsreaders (the "real" ones from
the old days) and the standard width of a text terminal is 80chars for
historical reasons.

In my case the netscape GUI text field has

wich presumably is the message pane.

approximately a width of 80chars too, that's no coincidence.

If it's 'approximately' 80 chars yes then that is a coincidence.
Folder pane and message pane have to share the screen width.
You decide the width of both by moving the divider.

Yes, but why do Netscape use a font size by default that leaves you
approx. 80chars if the folder pane has a useful width? IMHO no
coincidence.

[...]
With Netscape you can simply use the header reference list. Just a
single click (left button for replacing the current message, middle
button for new window on my machines) completely without the redundant
attribute line. Another single or double click and you are back in the
original message.

That appears to be particular to Netscape Communicator.
That wasn't even copied to Thunderbird.

You surely have an explanation how your supposedly "perfect Netscape
clone" can suffer from such an important feature ...

It's the better solution

Pity it appears limited to Communicator.

because is always works, otherwise you have to convince the whole world

So now you have to convince the whole world to use (a discontinued)
Communicator.

I wonder if Netscape would be the only newsreader who can handle the
reference list. In contrary I assume that most keyboard controlled CLI
newsreaders do it this way.

to use oversized attribute lines first

They don't *need* to be oversized, something saying like e.g. <message-link>
would be sufficient.

But even with my (not extremely long name) they are over 72chars, what
is my current line length limit.

[linewrap to avoid horizontal scrolling]
I have configured it this way.
I want it to break oversized lines so that I don't have to scroll to the right.

Another flaw of your toy. OE doesn't have that problem, it just wraps
that line on the visible screen (without inserting a linebreak)

That was a misunderstanding. Netscape do the same only in the GUI pane
(not in the message). It is nevertheless harder to read.

Real line breaks are inserted only when "Send" is clicked. I have
configured it to wrap lines at 72chars [1] (but this rule only is
applied to the unquoted ones). Because my own attribute line is also
unquoted, this rule apply for it too.

I use Netscape

You mean, that toy that they now call Mozilla Thunderbird.

Yes, it's a toy (as most GUI programs are).

In LUNIX maybe.
There is nothing particularly wrong with Window programs.

That depends on the definition of "toy".

But Mozilla (or that what today is called Netscape by mistake)

Your newsclient says Mozilla.

Yes. Netscape set its "agent string" to Mozilla but the product itself
was distributed as "Netscape Communicator". Since those days (until
today) even the Internet Explorer fake himself as "Mozilla" in its agent
string.

The last real Netscape was version 4.8. Then Netscape was killed by
Microsoft, the code was released but thrown away and rewritten. The new
product based on the Gecko engine was called "Mozilla 1.x" (internally
Mozilla/5.0). The mail and newsreaders were still integrated. Anything
called Netscape from now on was a relabeled Mozilla or at least based on
it.

The last Mozilla was 1.7.x. The successor product is called "Sea
Monkey". So today "Mozilla" is again only an internal name.

Firefox and Thunderbird are developed in parallel with Mozilla (using
the same codebase).

and Thunderbird don't use the Netscape code, they are completely
rewritten with the same look & feel.

Including the same flaws.

Maybe, I have never used Mozillas news part or Thunderbird.

[...]
Netscape does support proportional font too.
I don't like it because it breaks ASCII graphics and "^^^^" markings.

Which of course are mucho important.

Indeed.

[...]
(this ensures the correct number of ">" signs on every _displayed_ line):

It only does so because it doesn't hit on it's flaws that way.

Or it simply cannot handle flawed attribute lines correctly.

Nor long message text lines.

NACK.

[...]
You a troll? Or just a babblebot.

No, remember that you have startet this discussion.

No I didn't. You did. You a troll or just a babblebot?

NACK again, but we should stop it here.

[...]
The following warning recommends not to change the quoted text (I
respect this in my quotes).

It says nothing about preserving attribution lines -

They get quoted. From that time on it's part of the contributed text

I do now preserve them for you.

[...]
But all lines are wrapped for the GUI to avoid scrolling

Exactly. Nothing particular to do with long attribution lines.

(this is what makes my life harder).

Because you are using a toy. If it wasn't a toy it would use a window without
horizontal scrollbars and wrap those lines automatically, whether there is a
line break in it or not.

Oops, surprise, Communicator doesn't have a horizontal scroll bar in the mes-
sage pane either. And the long attribute line doesn't fall off the screen either.
So what's exactly with that scrolling problem?

The wrapped parts have no quoting signs. Without coloured depth that's
hard to read.

[...]
You can't use the reference list contained in every message header?

Nope.

OK, in this case as a compromise I will try to preserve your attribution
lines but I stay with the recommended name only.

That's OK with me, I changed to that already since those mail addresses
are often useless anyway and no functionality is lost by omitting them.

Good. Then we should come to EOD.

[...]


Micha

[1] So that a quote-depth of 4 still fit into 80chars as recommended by
different sources like http://www.usenet.org.uk/ukpost.html
.

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