What is it about top posting that some people get in a huff about? I don't come across many people that have a problem with it, and I always top post, and I am not the only one, but there aren't many. To me, its easier to read someone's reply when it on top than to run all the way to the bottom.
Not posted as an attack on anyone, just reminded about it and wanted to ask.
Per "Shades" :
Seems like most people dislike it, so I try not to do it.
Personally, when reading through a thread, I prefer to see it. Reason: too many people quote umpteen lines - or all of - a message and then just put in one or two lines of reply. Top-posting makes whose easier to read bc I don't have to keep scrolling down.
In an ideal world, everybody would snip out just the quotes they're addressing and bottom-post.
But the world isn't ideal and I've got no problem with top posting.
Sure gets some people's panties in a knot, don't it? :-)
That's what the disagreements are about. The people who complain are upset because they feel that others are making it more difficult, and more time-consuming, for them to read USENET, email lists, &c. Having to scroll past a long discussion for each and every new comment is a royal pain, thus the complaints about "bottom" posting. Entering a news group for the first time today, and seeing a posting that starts "I agree.", with no hint as to *what* the poster is agreeing with, is just as bad, and the reason for complaints about "top" posting.
Back in the old days (I've been using the 'net actively for 20 years), we all agreed to do it the way I do in this message; quoting just enough to establish context. When a newbie did it wrong, someone pointed out the mistake, and that was that. Then, everybody and their grandmother got online, and Microsoft made software that tricked all the newbies into breaking just about every established convention, and now there's no hope of ever having common standards again. That's just something we'll all have to find ways to live with.
Personally, I have so little time available for USENET, and so many groups I'd like to read, that I take the easy way out: when I see a "top" posting where I don't immediately understand the context, or a "bottom" posting where I would have to scroll to find the new text, then I simply move on to the next posting. The same goes for really atrocious formatting or language. Life's too short. :-)
-tih
:-)
-tih
I personally prefer top posting. I haven't bothered to set up a newsreader on Linux, which is what I'm now using at home. I messed with it, but it was very slow and not very intuitive. I like Google Groups because I can log in and check it from anywhere, and it manages to keep track of the threads I'm active in.
But in either case, threads are displayed in a spanning tree format and it's pretty easy for me to figure out who's responding to what. To me, if you can't figure that part out you should learn how, and not bitch.
My one complaint was the lack of quoting that Google does/did. I did a search and figured out how to do it so that I didn't have to cut and paste quotes to respond to.
So this is a response / test post to see how it worked... :-)
We'll see...
~jp
Some folks get elitist about it.. they say that ______ (insert top or bottom) posting is the correct way...
I find that it really depends on the thread and how the other folks reply... if some top post and others bottom, it's kind of hard to follow.. I will usually top post a short reply to a long post... so folks can see a one line answer without having to scroll down to the bottom of the original post..
IMHO, there is no right or wrong way...
Mac
Bottom posting places the texts in chronological order. Readers can see, for example, the question and then the answer it elicited -- as in this message. It is no big deal if there is only one question and only one answer (again like this message), but once a thread grows and you start getting replies to replies to replies, then bottom posting makes things much easier to understand and follow the discussion.
Top posting, at best, makes the reader play Jeopardy: first you get the answer, then the question. More often, you get an answer followed by a gadzillion previous unsnipped replies and you don't know just what the answer was in reply to. I've seen flame wars start because (methinks) top posting and lack of snipping caused confusion over who was replying what in reply to whom.
Personally, I try to bottom post and trim previously quoted material to just that needed to understand my reply (again, like I am doing in this message). But I also try to not be an annoying zealot about it.
What I do about that is set my news reader to hide quoted material. That way (for example) when I opened your message, Pete, what I saw at the beginning was:
[quoted text hidden]...followed by what you wrote. I turn that feature off if the message is unclear or if I otherwise want to see the context. Saves me a lot of time and no end of aggrivation, as I share your opinion of the bad habit of not trimming quotes while replying.
I think most news readers can do this, but of course I haven't tried them all. In Pan, which is what I use, you do this in "View - Hide quoted text", or even easier, use the keyboard shortcut "Q" (for quote). Forte Agent, which I see you use, should have a similar option.
Per Warren Post:
Haven't been able to find it in my reader (Agent) yet.... but that's a heckuva good feature and I'm going to keep looking.
Thanks.
Pete... in Agent, highlight just the part that you want quoted before you hit the "reply" button..
Mac
Glad to meet a fellow penguinhead here, Jon. I found Pan to be almost brainless to set up and use. Most distros come with Pan on their install disks. A newer newsreader for Linux is Thunderbird, which has more eye candy and some people find more intuitive, but Pan is lighter and faster. Again, Thunderbird is probably on your install disks.
The übergeeks use leafnode for its speed and power, but intuitive it ain't.
I just get rid of everything like this, simple and easy, and wouldn't it be the least confusing or maybe the cleanest way? it's all good to me, if I'm interested in a thread I'll weed through just about anything...if I want to be sure I make a point I will include the question.
peace
Well I'm still pretty new to Linux. I can get around Windows (or DOS) machines just fine, but after the last unprovoked crash, which came 2 weeks after a clean installation, I said "screw it" and loaded up Fedora on a freshly formatted drive.
I have the "dummies" book and found it useful, but haven't had the time to really dig into mine. Plus when you spend 40 hours a week maintaining a testing lab of PCs you tend to not really want to work on your own when you get home :-(
I need to d/l Thunderbird for that very reason. I have Evolution loaded by default, but it's extremely slow and the organization of new posts leaves much to be desired.
Thanks for the suggestion on Pan. I'll have a look at it.
~jp
Per Warren Post:
Which distro to you prefer?
uh--huh
so lemme git this rite.......................
this group has turned into an eddy quit forum.
ooops......
forgot to quote......
~:~ MarshMonster
oo L O
it's ok, as long as the folks reading your reply know WHAT you're replying to..
*g*Mac
More or less how I started. I opened our town's first cybercafé in 2000 and got tired of apologizing to customers for unstable workstations and doing clean installs all the time. I tried Linux, made it look and feel like Windows so that the customers would feel at home, and had no more problems. Just like that, easy.
If we're talking about the same book, yes, it's good. When you outgrow it, O'Reilly's _Linux in a Nutshell_ is an excellent reference. And the very best book I know is available as a free download from
You must have a newer version of Evolution than I do. I have 1.4.6 and it doesn't do Usenet. I agree, it is awfully large and slow, at least on my ancient hardware. I use it out of inertia, but I am sure that there are better email clients out there. Sylpheed is supposed to be much lighter even than Thunderbird for email, which one of these days I ought to try.
I started with Mandrake (now called Mandriva,
I'm running Mandrake 10.0, which is pretty old. Everyone says I ought to upgrade, but my attitude is, if it works great, why change?
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