Re: Line widths in postings, usenet vs. bulletin boards (forums)

On Thu, 25 Jun 2009 15:44:38 -0500, Mark wrote:

A final thought - I really don't like the limitations and lack
of options of the text editor used in this forum.

This (usenet) forum doesn't "use any editor."

Each user, however, reads, posts, and edits using specific software
(either in his/her own computer or some web site)
which does all of the above.

I made the lines too wide in my last post
and you see how chopped-up they appear.
I think Bill Markwick once commented
the max line length is 60 characters.

Usenet peering servers may have some limit, but you might never hit it.

I don't see any line length limit
in either RFC997 or RFC3997 (NNTP protocol),
other than 512 characters for protocol command lines.

When it comes to mailing via SMTP, RFC2822 (section 2.1.1) says
"Each line of characters MUST be no more than 998 characters,
and SHOULD be no more than 78 characters, excluding the CRLF."

However, "Quoted-Printable" encoding (RFC2045) allows extended line lengths,
by breaking them up during transmission to no more than 76 characters,
excluding the CRLF, then re-assembling the lines at the recipient's end;
this type of encoding applies to usenet, as well as to email
(as does "base64" binary encoding, which may still be of text material),
so some people's news readers may accomodate wide lines just fine
(otherwise long URLs would be chopped up, for example),
while other people's might not.

Various Usenet FAQs may make "maximum line length" suggestions,
which usually cluster around 68 to 76,
but this is only to pacify various personal news reader software (and web software),
which is otherwise likely to start line wrapping of its own accord,
while displaying or editing -- some very ancient documents
are also mindful of the 80-character limit of early "dumb terminals" :)

Note that each time another "quoting level" is added, due to
subsequent posts quoting earlier posts by inserting leading characters,
the lines tend to keep growing longer, so "think ahead" :)
[or be thoughtful, and re-format while quoting]

When posting UserRPL programs which one might copy and paste to a calculator,
particularly if lines end with @ comments like this,
I try to keep lines short enough not to wrap on your screen,
which could cause syntax errors and compilation failures
(or else produce a new and different program :)

Similarly for "binary" (or hex) postings;
I arrange to build any longer strings
by concatenating several shorter lines.

Okay, so I can't count!

I compose using a constant-width (monospace) font,
and if I want to mind my line widths carefully,
I just paste in a "ruler line" while I'm composing:

----+----1----+----2----+----3----+----4----+----5----+----6----+----7----+-

Let's see how others perceive this longer line:

----+----1----+----2----+----3----+----4----+----5----+----6----+----7----+----8----+----9----+----0----+----1----+----2

Can't we get a better text editor for this forum,
like the one they have at http://forum.codecall.net/ ?

Unlike usenet, which "streams" postings to "peering" servers
all around the world, private "forums" are hosted on a single
web site, using any of a variety of distinct software back-ends,
which generally permit the user to format articles themselves,
using an html-like "BB Code," e.g. [b]make this bold[/b]

forum.codecall.net, for example,
appears to be using "vBulletin Version 3.8.0"
as a back end, as it says near the bottom,
but with a modern "skin" ("Template Design by Gavick.com")
thus hardly resembling
the [ugly?] "classic" vBulletin: http://www.vbulletin.com/forum/
BB Code: http://www.vbulletin.com/forum/misc.php?do=bbcode

Here's a forum powered by its own free (GPL) software:
http://www.phpbb.com/community/

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