On Fri, 20 Feb 2004 00:12:00 GMT, Martin Euredjian wrote:>> When I reply to a top-posted message with a sig -- like yours -- >> everything below the sig is gone, as here. The _)(*&^%$#@!! news program >> snips it all silently. > >Really? That's amazing. Why would they do that?Because it's implicit in the Usenet standards. The signature seperator is defined as a line consisting of: <hyphen><hyphen><space><eol> One of the relevant standards (possibly RFC850, but I can't remember for sure) states that the sig should always be stripped in replies, and the better newspeaders do it automatically. Usenet standards always assume bottom-posting, so this behaviour is convenient.>Maybe you need to try a different reader. I'm using Outlook Express and >directly off the Web when travelling with a browser.Outlook Express breaks all sorts of standards, and can't be regarded as a real news reader in consequence (it's barely adequate even as a mail client). As an example, OE strips all trailing spaces on lines, so it cannot generate a standard-compliant sig seperator. It also does quoting incorrectly, by adding a space following the quote character, and by wrapping quoted lines at the same length as new text (it will also wrap continuous strings - hence the fragmented URLs in OE posts). I can't even begin to illustrate all of OE's misbehaviour, but this paragraph demonstrates one of it's more fatuous foibles - OE users can't even read it, since it's assumed to be a script attachment! -- Max
Dual-stack (Forth) processors
Started by ●February 16, 2004
Reply by ●February 28, 20042004-02-28
Reply by ●February 28, 20042004-02-28
On Tue, 24 Feb 2004 13:30:28 GMT, Randy Yates wrote:>Perhaps the problem isn't top- or bottom-posting per se, but that the >quoting method used is inconsistent. If folks are careful to ensure >the "Tom says:" lines are properly maintained and use the same quote >character and indentation style, either posting style is fairly easily- >parsed, in my opinion.While your point is entirely sensible, it just doesn't work, since the most common "news client" in use is probably Outlook Express (Outlook proper can't do NNTP at all), and it simply ignores many Usenet standards. OE users are prevented from quoting correctly, or even generating a standard sig separator. Personally, I'm not too fussed about top-posting per se. What does irritate is the lazy poster who can't be bothered to edit the quoted text at all, so you end up with reams of irrelevant chat going back to the original post. I'm just as likely to ignore such a post irrespective of whether the new text is at the top or the bottom. -- Max
Reply by ●February 28, 20042004-02-28
Max wrote:> I can't even > begin to illustrate all of OE's misbehaviour, but this paragraph > demonstrates one of it's more fatuous foibles - OE users can't even > read it, since it's assumed to be a script attachment!I don't want to continue an OT conversation posted to so many groups, but can you explain what that means? Why does OE assume the above paragraph is a script attachment? I don't see anything special about it. Hmmm... is it the word begin at the start of a line with two spaces after it? -- Rick "rickman" Collins rick.collins@XYarius.com Ignore the reply address. To email me use the above address with the XY removed. Arius - A Signal Processing Solutions Company Specializing in DSP and FPGA design URL http://www.arius.com 4 King Ave 301-682-7772 Voice Frederick, MD 21701-3110 301-682-7666 FAX
Reply by ●February 28, 20042004-02-28
On Sat, 28 Feb 2004 11:53:43 -0500, rickman wrote:>I don't want to continue an OT conversation posted to so many groups,Nor did I, really, since I don't like cross-posting either, but I don't know what groups the participants in this thread inhabit, so...>but can you explain what that means? Why does OE assume the above >paragraph is a script attachment? I don't see anything special about >it. Hmmm... is it the word >begin at the start of a line with two spaces after it?Yep - got it in one. OE will strip off the lines at the end of the post, and claim that they constitute an attachment named "to illustrate all of OE's misbehaviour, but this paragraph.dat" - ROTFLMAO! There's also a massive security hole there, though I don't think I'll go into detail. It's only one such flaw amongst a multitude, however. -- Max
Reply by ●February 29, 20042004-02-29
On Sat, 28 Feb 2004 15:29:36 +0000 (UTC), Max wrote:>As an example, OE strips all trailing spaces on lines, >so it cannot generate a standard-compliant sig seperator.Apparently, that particular bug has been fixed in recent OE versions. ISTR OE v6 did resolve quite a few of the sillier deficiencies, but there's still enough left to make life interesting ;o) -- Max
Reply by ●March 1, 20042004-03-01
Max wrote:> > OE will strip off the lines at the end of the post, and claim that > they constitute an attachment named > "to illustrate all of OE's misbehaviour, but this paragraph.dat" > - ROTFLMAO! > > There's also a massive security hole there, though I don't think I'll > go into detail. It's only one such flaw amongst a multitude, however.The hole is smaller than you think, since the "attachment" is empty. Presumably OE didn't find the end of the attachment so just threw the contents away. :)
