[NTLUG:Discuss] list etiquette

[Jeff Demel]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: terry
> Sent: Monday, July 21, 2003 1:28 PM
>
> Yes, Micorsoft's Outlook Express defaults to showing newer 
> messages at 
> the top but I'm pretty sure it's still up to you whether you want to 
> stay with the default or reverse it, but I fail to see what 
> that has to 
> do with top posting.
> 
> >I don't have to guess the sequence of messages or look at the time 
> >stamp, I know which came in first and which came in last.
> >
> Neither do I, and I don't see what that's got to do with top 
> posting either.
...
> Start from the bottom?
> ..... Somehow that makes no since [to me] at all?

Since you do not understand, let me try and make more sense.  It really does
have everything to do with top posting.  Very simply, I was suggesting a
correlation - that there is a relationship between the logical order of
messages in an inbox, and that of an email body.  Really it's about the user
experience, where in order to make it easier and more logical for users,
there are usually similar logical structures used so that people don't have
to re-learn things all the time.  You see, all inboxes I've ever seen
default to last posts last, and new posts first.  I can hear you now, so let
me nip this one in the bud, NO I'm sure this is not true for all email
clients, and YES the default can usually be changed.  Okay?  But normal
users, including me, do not bother to change those kinds of defaults - they
just learn them.  I know it makes more sense to me.  Anyway, what I was
saying is that user interface design is directly linked to one's computing
experience, and keeping things the same is key to ease of use and user
retention.  Basic development ideas, I know, but it's true.  Ask any tester.
Basically, I was using a figure of speech to say "as this ... so this".

> Well if every one's bottom-posting there's no problem 
> figuring which is 
> the new part.  

Agreed.  But that is hardly ever the case.  In fact, as posts to this thread
itself show, even people who talk about bottom-posting rarely do.  They seem
to do mid-posting, where they break up the original with their own comments
instead of commenting at the bottom.  I find this, as I said in my original
post, not too confusing when done once, but after a couple times, especially
with people commenting and marking old posts differently, VERY confusing.

>First comes the question, then comes the answers. What 
> could be more logical?

Well: First the answers, then the questions - as I said before.  :)

If I've been following a thread, I know the questions, and the previous
posts, and I want the new information right away and on top.  It makes
sense.  It's like other structures I use on the computer.  If I'm coming in
to a thread late, it's easy enough to scroll to the bottom and read up.  Or
read through the posts one at a time.  Which, you would have to do anyway
with bottom-posting.

Cheerio.

-Jeff