[tdf-discuss] Communication in Mailinglist (was:Re: Request: Installation Instructions)

[Friedrich Strohmaier <damokles4-listen@bits-fritz.de>]

Hi Michael, *,

Michael Wheatland schrieb:

>> You were responding *my* mail not referring to my contents.
>> Friedrich

>I am new to this mailing list thing.

Ah, O.K. so I will explain how I handle this (which is near to the
recommended way to do).

>I use Gmail and I reply by
>clicking the 'reply' space at the very bottom of the conversation
>list.

I don't know Gmail, but what You tell from it's not a very mailing list
capable mail client.

>How are you able to tell which message I reply to?

The secret is mails sorted by discussion "threads". Every time You
answer a mail your mailer (aparently even gmail does :o)) ) puts some
information, who was the "parent" of the answer.  You don't see that
because it's saved in the mails headerpart.

If Your mailer is capable sorting mails by thread, You will se a tree of
mails with branches each time forked, when there are more than one
answers for the referred mail.

I took a screenshot of the related part of this discussion in my mailer'
window:
http://devel.libreofficebox.org/static/general/misc/download/threaded_listmails.png

Byond the mails list in the windows right column You can see how inline
quoting makes it easy to participate the discussion without retyping and
(interpreting!) the referred statement You're commenting. That ">"s at
beginning of the lines mark the quotet text - each answer adding one
more so You can see the history of the answer. 

that >>> quoted part was text from Craigs originating mail which more
correctly should have been mentioned in a apropriate "attribution line"
like:

René Engelhard schrieb:
>> Craig A. Eddy wrote:

The archive shows the whole thread here:
http://www.documentfoundation.org/lists/discuss/thrd32.html

It wouldn't harm to have a look here for tips regarding useful quoting:
http://netmeister.org/news/learn2quote.html

>And what should I be doing to ensure that the message gets to it's
>intended target?  But thanks for the tip.

Quite simple. Do what you would do in real life: Answer whom You want to
answer and start for new (new mail - no answer) if You start a new
topic. :o)) 

>Yes I was most defininately referring to Rene's comments.
>I have experienced a similar type of arrogance amongst 2 other open
>source projects, one of which was resolved quickly and resolutely by
>it's members actively denouncing such attitudes within the community.

I think it's not arrogance, but rather a result of unilateral view on
peoples work. René is a valued member of debian and
openoffice.org/libreoffice project.


Gruß/regards
-- 
Friedrich
Libreoffice-Box http://libreofficebox.org/
LibreOffice and more on CD/DVD images
(german version already started)


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