"David Candy" <.> wrote in message
And most users can't reconstruct the link.
--- REPLY SEPARATOR ---
(needed only due to poster using quoted-printable format)
And many users can't even figure out how to use the Shift key, period
character, or have a clue that they are asking someone ELSE their question
(if they even pose a question) and should make it intelligible to someone
other than themself. Quoted-printable breaks more than it fixes. You end
up infuriating more users than kowtowing to the boobs that cannot figure out
how to copy/paste a URL. Besides users that complain quoted-printable
doesn't display correctly in their NNTP client, I've also been told by some
webnews users that the line ends up being as one really long line instead of
a line-wrapped paragraph. Some newsreaders don't know how to handle the
encoded characters used when quoted-printable is used. Just because a
format works for e-mail doesn't mean it is good in Usenet.
Just look at how much more difficult it becomes to insert in-body replies
(i.e., instead of of one huge disconnected reply at the end, you insert a
reply next to whatever it pertains). You can't tell where the original
content ends and the inserted reply begins unless you use clumsy and message
separator lines, like I have to use in replying to your posts (even when I'm
not inserting in-body replies but just one reply at the end). I don't know
how other NNTP clients handle delineating original from reply, and since you
are also using OE, the problem (in OE) is that there is no automatic
differentiation between who said what. Because we are still stuck with
using plain-text for Usenet posts (to remain compliant and compatible with
most users), we cannot use formatting, colors, auto-indents, blockquote,
indented tables with borders, or other visually appealing means to
differentiate who said what. Yes, there are add-ons or other NNTP clients
that will color-code, indent, or whatever but that is NOT what is actually
*in* the post and obviously not every user are using the same NNTP client.
Actually I got into several arguments with old farts and Usenet wizards
about the use of quoted-printable. I liked it because of the line-wrapping
when posting (and when reading it provided your newsreader supports it, and
not all do) but it really does suck when replying (because there is no
distinguishable separation between the original and reply content). I
didn't have a vested interest in using quoted-printable other than as a
preference. After considerable debates, the other side has repeatedly
convinced me it was a bad format for Usenet.
Yes, the multiple indentation using quote characters is messy. It's been 6
years since quoted-printable got published in an RFC and yet there are many
NNTP clients or webnews interfaces that don't support it. Although non-OE
users will remark that their NNTP client handles quoted-printable
"correctly", I really haven't found an RFC that dictates or suggests how any
client should handle the quoted-printable content when replying. The RFCs
define how it is constructed but not how to handle it in replies, so every
NNTP client could do it differently.
If an RFC ever gets written or updated that specifies how NNTP client should
or must handle logical paragraphs that are physically encoded within the
quoted-printable format, and after some time has passed to let the NNTP
clients time to catch up, then I see it as an okay format in Usenet. I can
find the RFCs that define how to encode using quoted-printable format. Do
you know of any that specify how NNTP client will encode their replies when
the original content used quoted-printable?
I really don't think arguing in favor of quoted-printable because of a few
boobs that cannot figure out how to copy/paste a URL (and for a sender that
doesn't take this into consideration before submitting their post) doesn't
make much of a rational argument for its use. It is stupid that there
is(are) RFC(s) to define quoted-printable but none to define how to handle
it in a reply.
