Annoying sigs at end of posts (was Terry Birds "Could we please Learn to trim our posts"



N

nancree

Guest
"I know before I post this that this is a losing battle, but could we
please, please, please learn to trim posts?" Terry Pulliam Byrd"

While we're on the subject, how about dropping those tiresome "sigs"
that have been repeated endlessly for years. Sorry, Terry, but I'm so
tired of your sig--"If the bird had been as tender as the waitress'
breast, etc, etc." --it has been repeated for several years now. And
Default User/Brian's "tv is a babysitter", and Wayne's "Ok,Ok, I take
it back". There are many of them. I'm tired of them, and I'm sure
others are. Tell a joke once and let it go, please?? Even Sheldon
finally! after years and years of "I try to be open-minded, but not so
open that my brains fall out" , finally gave it up.

Sorry if I offend, but someone had to say it.

Regards,
Nancree
 
nancree wrote:

> "I know before I post this that this is a losing battle, but could we
> please, please, please learn to trim posts?" Terry Pulliam Byrd"
>
> While we're on the subject, how about dropping those tiresome "sigs"
> that have been repeated endlessly for years. Sorry, Terry, but I'm so
> tired of your sig--"If the bird had been as tender as the waitress'
> breast, etc, etc." --it has been repeated for several years now. And
> Default User/Brian's "tv is a babysitter", and Wayne's "Ok,Ok, I take
> it back". There are many of them. I'm tired of them, and I'm sure
> others are. Tell a joke once and let it go, please?? Even Sheldon
> finally! after years and years of "I try to be open-minded, but not so
> open that my brains fall out" , finally gave it up.
>
> Sorry if I offend, but someone had to say it.
>
> Regards,
> Nancree
>

I agree. There are some very nice sigs here, including Terry's, but a
little variety is nice!

Peter
 
nancree wrote:
> "I know before I post this that this is a losing battle, but could we
> please, please, please learn to trim posts?" Terry Pulliam Byrd"
>
> While we're on the subject, how about dropping those tiresome "sigs"
> that have been repeated endlessly for years. [snip]

As to trimming posts, top posting, annoying or long sigs, and other
annoyances like cross posters and unlabeled OT posts:

* I have read newsgroups for many years with Outlook Express,
Agent, and now Google and in every case it has been easy to scroll or
click past all the millions of lines that I didn't feel like reading,
so long as the mouse was working properly. Some days it's the most
exercise I get all day.

* My personal experience is that the rest of the world stubbornly
refuses, over and over agin, to conform itself to my personal
preferences. Hence I have to put up with capital punishment, unjust
wars, racism and all the other isms, not to mention posters with no
sense of humor, the relentless attempts to drag down cooking/eating
standards in the name of time saving and convenience, and of course the
ego parades.

* So my conclusion is that you all should post however you want,
about whatever you want, and I'll read what I want and skip the rest.
Feel free to do the same. -aem
 
nancree wrote:

> "I know before I post this that this is a losing battle, but could we
> please, please, please learn to trim posts?" Terry Pulliam Byrd"
>
> While we're on the subject, how about dropping those tiresome "sigs"
> that have been repeated endlessly for years. Sorry, Terry, but I'm so
> tired of your sig--"If the bird had been as tender as the waitress'
> breast, etc, etc." --it has been repeated for several years now. And
> Default User/Brian's "tv is a babysitter", and Wayne's "Ok,Ok, I take
> it back". There are many of them. I'm tired of them, and I'm sure
> others are. Tell a joke once and let it go, please?? Even Sheldon
> finally! after years and years of "I try to be open-minded, but not so
> open that my brains fall out" , finally gave it up.
>
> Sorry if I offend, but someone had to say it.

Also important IMO would be that folks with big honking
sigs should use a sig delimiter.

A sig delimiter is a line that starts with "--" and contains nothing
else.

When someone replies, everything after the "--" will be left out
of the reply. It's automatic, and almost all newsreaders will
function this way.

So, put a sig delimiter *before* your big honking sigs.

In theory everyone should snip off all the trailing stuff in
their replies anyway, but you know how that goes.

--
Reg email: RegForte (at) (that free MS email service) (dot) com
 
[email protected] writes:

>Also important IMO would be that folks with big honking
>sigs should use a sig delimiter.
>
>A sig delimiter is a line that starts with "--" and contains nothing
>else.

nope - it's two dashes followed by a whitespace character: "-- "
 
Blatt Mack wrote:

> [email protected] writes:
>
>
>>Also important IMO would be that folks with big honking
>>sigs should use a sig delimiter.
>>
>>A sig delimiter is a line that starts with "--" and contains nothing
>>else.
>
>
> nope - it's two dashes followed by a whitespace character: "-- "
>

Interesting. Mine doesn't contain a ws char in the sig file
and it works fine.

--
Reg email: RegForte (at) (that free MS email service) (dot) com
 
In article <[email protected]>,
Reg <[email protected]> wrote:


> > nope - it's two dashes followed by a whitespace character: "-- "
> >
>
> Interesting. Mine doesn't contain a ws char in the sig file
> and it works fine.

Interesting, because it's there. Perhaps your newsreader is smart
enough to know that you intended the "--" to be a delimiter and changed
it to "-- ".

--
Dan Abel
[email protected]
Petaluma, California, USA
 
Dan Abel wrote:

> In article <[email protected]>,
> Reg <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>>nope - it's two dashes followed by a whitespace character: "-- "
>>>
>>
>>Interesting. Mine doesn't contain a ws char in the sig file
>>and it works fine.
>
>
> Interesting, because it's there. Perhaps your newsreader is smart
> enough to know that you intended the "--" to be a delimiter and changed
> it to "-- ".
>

Precisely. Software developers have learned over the years to
make things as easy as possible. You wouldn't want setting up
a newsreader to be like configuring sendmail or something.
Forcing a user to include the space isn't necessary.

--
Reg email: RegForte (at) (that free MS email service) (dot) com
 
Reg wrote:

> Also important IMO would be that folks with big honking
> sigs should use a sig delimiter.
>
> A sig delimiter is a line that starts with "--" and contains nothing
> else.
>
> When someone replies, everything after the "--" will be left out
> of the reply. It's automatic, and almost all newsreaders will
> function this way.

Which still ignores that one should trim up (and out!) all that
extraneous stuff. Why just assume a machine will do enough?
Goomba
 
[email protected] writes:
>Dan Abel wrote:
>
>> In article <[email protected]>,
>> Reg <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>>>>nope - it's two dashes followed by a whitespace character: "-- "
>>>>
>>>
>>>Interesting. Mine doesn't contain a ws char in the sig file
>>>and it works fine.
>>
>>
>> Interesting, because it's there. Perhaps your newsreader is smart
>> enough to know that you intended the "--" to be a delimiter and changed
>> it to "-- ".
>>
>
>Precisely. Software developers have learned over the years to
>make things as easy as possible. You wouldn't want setting up
>a newsreader to be like configuring sendmail or something.
>Forcing a user to include the space isn't necessary.


what have we learned from this lesson boys & girls?

A. reg has never used a Microsoft product
B. reg has had indigestion all day
C. A whitespace character is kind of like a McGuffin - nothing at all
D. all of the above
E. ob food: when making a roux you may substitute whole wheat flour
but it is not recommended
 
Goomba38 wrote:

> Reg wrote:
>
>> Also important IMO would be that folks with big honking
>> sigs should use a sig delimiter.
>>
>> A sig delimiter is a line that starts with "--" and contains nothing
>> else.
>>
>> When someone replies, everything after the "--" will be left out
>> of the reply. It's automatic, and almost all newsreaders will
>> function this way.
>
>
> Which still ignores that one should trim up (and out!) all that
> extraneous stuff. Why just assume a machine will do enough?

It doesn't ignore anything. It's a single datapoint in
what is a fairly broad subject.

None of this stuff ever worries me, however. If I ever speak
to the issue of "how to post", it's always in the spirit of
offering advice where it might be welcome and/or useful. Trying
to exert control is pointless.

--
Reg email: RegForte (at) (that free MS email service) (dot) com
 
tert in seattle wrote:

> what have we learned from this lesson boys & girls?
>
> A. reg has never used a Microsoft product
> B. reg has had indigestion all day
> C. A whitespace character is kind of like a McGuffin - nothing at all
> D. all of the above

Thanks for the laugh. It helped brighten up a rather dull
day at the keyboard.

I admit I don't know what a McGuffen is, though.

> E. ob food: when making a roux you may substitute whole wheat flour
> but it is not recommended

Tried it. Didn't like it.

--
Reg email: RegForte (at) (that free MS email service) (dot) com
 
tert in seattle wrote:
> [snip]
> C. A whitespace character is kind of like a McGuffin - nothing at all

A nerdy blast from the past. In the old DOS - Basic days you could
distinguish between the regular whitespace created by the spacebar and
the whitespace created by the ASCII code. I used to use the latter in
passwords and attempts to use the other would fail. Or was it the
underscore character? Senior moment, I can't remember. -aem
 
"aem" <[email protected]> wrote

> A nerdy blast from the past. In the old DOS - Basic days you could
> distinguish between the regular whitespace created by the spacebar and
> the whitespace created by the ASCII code.

Days older than that ... you're thinking of null vs space?

nancy
 
aem wrote:

> tert in seattle wrote:
>
>>[snip]
>>C. A whitespace character is kind of like a McGuffin - nothing at all
>
>
> A nerdy blast from the past. In the old DOS - Basic days you could
> distinguish between the regular whitespace created by the spacebar and
> the whitespace created by the ASCII code. I used to use the latter in
> passwords and attempts to use the other would fail. Or was it the
> underscore character? Senior moment, I can't remember. -aem
>

Yeah, but what is a McGuffin? :)

PS: od -x

--
Reg email: RegForte (at) (that free MS email service) (dot) com
 
[email protected] writes:
>tert in seattle wrote:
>
>> what have we learned from this lesson boys & girls?
>>
>> A. reg has never used a Microsoft product
>> B. reg has had indigestion all day
>> C. A whitespace character is kind of like a McGuffin - nothing at all
>> D. all of the above
>
>Thanks for the laugh. It helped brighten up a rather dull
>day at the keyboard.
>
>I admit I don't know what a McGuffen is, though.

this is what Hitchcock said:

It might be a Scottish name, taken from a story about two men in
a train. One man says, 'What's that package up there in the baggage
rack?' And the other answers, 'Oh that's a McGuffin.' The first one asks
'What's a McGuffin?' 'Well' the other man says, 'It's an apparatus
for trapping lions in the Scottish Highlands.' The first man says,
'But there are no lions in the Scottish Highlands,' and the other one
answers 'Well, then that's no McGuffin!' So you see, a McGuffin is
nothing at all.
 
Nancy Young wrote:
> "aem" <[email protected]> wrote
>
> > A nerdy blast from the past. In the old DOS - Basic days you could
> > distinguish between the regular whitespace created by the spacebar and
> > the whitespace created by the ASCII code.
>
> Days older than that ... you're thinking of null vs space?
>
Probably, if you say so. I was never a serious programmer, learned
just enough to fool around as part of the 'learn how your new tool
operates' process. I did sneak in once on a weekend just to load a
joke program on my secretary's new pc. It was called "drain," and when
she started the machine up Monday morning it gave her an alarm, said
the disk drive was flooded and that it would drain it, then spun the
drive while making a gurgling sound effect. I thought it was
hilarious. She thought she had broken her magical new toy. -aem
 
On 26 Jan 2006 15:17:40 -0800, "aem" <[email protected]> wrote:

>A nerdy blast from the past. In the old DOS - Basic days you could
>distinguish between the regular whitespace created by the spacebar and
>the whitespace created by the ASCII code. I used to use the latter in
>passwords and attempts to use the other would fail. Or was it the
>underscore character? Senior moment, I can't remember. -aem

Spacebar has always been CHR$(32) as returned by any INPUT$ or
INKEY There were other characters that were interpreted as a
space on the screen, though. If there was a function that
returned scancodes, then that may have been different. But I
can't recall any.

The TRS-80 and CBM BASIC I/O functions had two different
characters (can't call them ASCII) for SPACE and SHIFT-SPACE.
LET{SHIFT-SPACE}X=1 would generate an error, and INKEY() and
GET[#] would return differing values. But not on PC's
MS-BASIC/BASICA/QBASIC implementations.

ObFood: Vietnamese fermented eggplant/shrimp, Thai-style peanut
sauced rice vermicelli, and a pickled egg + onion for lunch today.
It's musgovian for dinner too, just haven't figured out what yet.

-sw
 
On Thu, 26 Jan 2006 21:03:03 GMT, Reg <[email protected]>
wrote:

>A sig delimiter is a line that starts with "--" and contains nothing
>else.

Howdy,

Actually, it is "-- " (that is dash-dash-space).

All the best,
--
Kenneth

If you email... Please remove the "SPAMLESS."
 
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