* Ed Harrison [03-14-04 19:18]:

** Reply to message from "Theo v. Werkhoven" on Sun, 14 Mar 2004 23:30:23 +0100

...

One more thing: please trim your lines to 72 chars max. to make reading and replying easier for the rest.

I set my e-mail program to wrap at 72 characters, and I have no problem with his message. Do you have word wrapping set in yours?

Well, your email client "?Polar ..." is not doing hard wrapping. I have posted your reply as I received it. c4-yourself. -- Patrick Shanahan Registered Linux User #207535 http://wahoo.no-ip.org @ http://counter.li.org HOG # US1244711

* Ed Harrison [03-15-04 06:46]:

** Reply to message from Patrick Shanahan on Sun, 14 Mar 2004 22:33:55 -0500

...

Well, your email client "?Polar ..." is not doing hard wrapping. I have posted your reply as I received it. c4-yourself.

I meant to say that it wraps as I receive e-mail. See above.

Wrapping as I compose only seems to mess up some other e-mail programs, giving multiple hard returns where not needed.

Mutt has the same ability, but your observation/complaint was about receiving email not wrapped to your viewing preference. I do not understand why you would not provide the same you expect to receive. Please enlighten. Envision that perhaps Mr. Werkhoven feels the same about wrapping with his editor of choice (remember linux _is_ choice). -- Patrick Shanahan Registered Linux User #207535 http://wahoo.no-ip.org @ http://counter.li.org HOG # US1244711

The Monday 2004-03-15 at 20:11 +0100, Theo v. Werkhoven wrote:

He does. Mutt does wrap when reading, but VI doesn't when replying, so long lines are really a pita to read while writing a response. VI can do re-formatting of lines/paragraphs of course, but that shouldn't be neccessary with well-written posts, and takes more of my time instead of the time of the person who seeks help.

I'm not going to make it hard on myself when replying, so my next rule is going to be to ignore posts with lines longer than 72 octets when the poster doesn't want to respect netiquette.

Is that (72 char wrap) a defined internet mail standard? I don't know, I ask :-) However, I know of some electronic mail formats (not necesarily internet) where the defined standard is precisely not to wrap when writing, but by the reader, and at the line size the reader prefers. Line feeds then signal paragraph end instead of line ends. Even mozilla behaves this way with one of its paragraph formats, I forgot which. In any case, Pine wraps those long lines when writing with a single keystroke and writes the necesary ">" simbols. I think it can be automated if I change something on the config, but I don't want to. It's no nuisance to me... I'm sure mutt/vi can do a similar thing. -- Cheers, Carlos Robinson

The Tuesday 2004-03-16 at 02:55 +0100, Philipp Thomas wrote:

...

However, I know of some electronic mail formats (not necesarily internet) where the defined standard is precisely not to wrap when writing, but by the reader, and at the line size the reader prefers. Line feeds then signal paragraph end instead of line ends.

Quoting such mails becomes a pain in text mode MUAs like mutt or pine as you have to manually reformat the text in order to pull out the part you're replying to. And as soon as you have multiple levels of quoting it becomes a total mess.

Frankly, I use Pine, and I don't find it a pain :-? It takes me a second or two to notice the long lines, then I move to the line in question, ctrl-J, done. True, I can type almost blindly, that's why I use a text only MUA :-) I take more time to properly think the answer, proof read it, spell check...

And most decent GUI MUAs do offer an option to limit the line length, although they tend to enforce that unconditionally which isn't that helpful now and then.

That's true... I find it a pain when I post tables or things pasted from some other program with long lines (specially logs) and I try to make sure that it remains readable after posting. Long lines would be faster for me in that case, but, as I don't know what is going to be used to read them, I try to had format them. A lot of time, I assure you. -- Cheers, Carlos Robinson

The Tuesday 2004-03-16 at 20:24 +0100, Theo v. Werkhoven wrote:

...

Is that (72 char wrap) a defined internet mail standard? I don't know, I ask :-)

http://RFC.net/rfc1855.html - Limit line length to fewer than 65 characters and end a line with a carriage return.

Ah, but that one is not a standard definition: | Netiquette Guidelines | |Status of This Memo | | This memo provides information for the Internet community. This memo | does not specify an Internet standard of any kind. Distribution of | this memo is unlimited. So it is not a requisite to follow their recomendations :-)

On usenet 72 chars is considered a good compromise between mails getting too long, or lines getting too long. I think it's valid for mailinglists aswell. 65 chars leaves a bit more room for quoting characters in long threads though.

Mm, I don't know what Pine uses... ah, 74: | composer-wrap-column = And anyway, xterm size can by changed a lot - mine is at 96 chars just now.

...

In any case, Pine wraps those long lines when writing with a single keystroke and writes the necesary ">" simbols. I think it can be automated if I change something on the config, but I don't want to.

It's no nuisance to me... I'm sure mutt/vi can do a similar thing.

Of course, but I don't want to change the format of a mail in a reply, unless absolutely neccessary.

In this case, it is necesary, because you don't see the text otherwise. If the original formating is one long line per paragraph, it is obvious that the intention (of the program designer, not the user, who probably knows nothing about it) is for the recipient to reflow as needed. As for me, I'm used to quote trimming (some times I remove partial paragraphs or sentences, except from the middle), so the original format is lost, if any. Most editors will do some reflowing automatically, so that's some thing I don't care much about, I'm afraid. -- Cheers, Carlos Robinson