Terseness

[jgv@swl.msd.ray.com (John Volan)]

While I highly respect Robert Dewar, I disagree with Jonathan Schilling.

(Nice and terse, right?  Gets right to the point, doesn't it?  But ...
what in the world am I referring to?  Hit a space now if you want to
find out. ;-)
\f

jls@summit.novell.com (-mlc-+Schilling J.) writes:

>I like the fact that Robert Dewar's posts are succinct and never quote 
>preceding posts.  Even if this is forced upon him by his news software,
>it's a blessed relief from the screenfulls of cascades you see all over
>the rest of Usenet.

I have to disagree with you here, Jonathan.  When someone responds to
a previous post, sometimes the response is hard to understand unless
it happens to immediately follow the original, or unless it quotes at
least part of the original.  My news software seems to sort posts by
time of arrival, not time of sending, and I frequently see a response
*after* the original post.  Depending on the transmission lags
involved, the original may occasionally appear *days* after the
response!  Even if the posts do arrive in sending order, there may be
a gap of several days between the original and the response, and I may
have forgotten what the original post said.  Or, if I let a few days go
by without reading the news, the original may already be long gone and
I may never see it at all!

I feel that a reasonable amount of quoting is a polite courtesy that
aids the reader's understanding.  Of course, like anything, this can
get out of hand if you take it to an extreme, but the opposite extreme
of not quoting at all is, IMHO, just as bad.

In Robert Dewar's case ... well, he's a very busy man, and the work
he's doing is of such importance to the future of Ada, that I think we
can all forgive him this slight indiscretion. :-)  Frankly, I'm
grateful that he can take the time to post to c.l.a at all!

John Volan

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