Re: Removal of my name
On Wed, Sep 20, 2006 at 02:02:52PM -0400, Don Welch, Merit Network wrote: something in HTML that i can not parse... care to repost in a format that is readable? --bill
On Wed, 20 Sep 2006 bmanning@vacation.karoshi.com wrote: > something in HTML that i can not parse... > care to repost in a format that is readable? Bill, it's really time for you to upgrade from UCB Mail to Pine. Those of us who've gotten with the program and upgraded to 1990's software get all the nasty <tag> things stripped out automatically! -Bill
On Wed, Sep 20, 2006 at 11:14:27AM -0700, Bill Woodcock wrote:
On Wed, 20 Sep 2006 bmanning@vacation.karoshi.com wrote: > something in HTML that i can not parse... > care to repost in a format that is readable?
Bill, it's really time for you to upgrade from UCB Mail to Pine. Those of us who've gotten with the program and upgraded to 1990's software get all the nasty <tag> things stripped out automatically!
-Bill
PINE? looking at MUTT, but i'm really partial to UCBMail stripping out all kinds of cruft/spam. Next you'll be telling me that IMAP is the wave of the future and that i should read email on some PDA/CELL thingie... --bill
at least a rather updated version of ucb mail, that also does imap / pop / ssl / smtp + auth etc "heirloom mailx" aka "nail" - http://nail.sourceforge.net On 9/20/06, bmanning@vacation.karoshi.com <bmanning@vacation.karoshi.com> wrote:
PINE? looking at MUTT, but i'm really partial to UCBMail stripping out all kinds of cruft/spam. Next you'll be telling me that IMAP is the wave of the future and that i should read email on some PDA/CELL thingie...
-- Suresh Ramasubramanian (ops.lists@gmail.com)
On Thu, Sep 21, 2006 at 09:38:15AM +0530, Suresh Ramasubramanian wrote:
at least a rather updated version of ucb mail, that also does imap / pop / ssl / smtp + auth etc
"heirloom mailx" aka "nail" - http://nail.sourceforge.net
Try: <http://heirloom.sourceforge.net/mailx.html>. Moved to Heirloom. -- Joe Yao ----------------------------------------------------------------------- This message is not an official statement of OSIS Center policies.
On Wed, Sep 20, 2006 at 11:14:27AM -0700, Bill Woodcock wrote:
On Wed, 20 Sep 2006 bmanning@vacation.karoshi.com wrote: > something in HTML that i can not parse... > care to repost in a format that is readable?
Bill, it's really time for you to upgrade from UCB Mail to Pine. Those of us who've gotten with the program and upgraded to 1990's software get all the nasty <tag> things stripped out automatically!
-Bill
It was tagged as text/html, but 'mutt' will usually pass such things off to my Web browser, and it didn't. Not sure why not. But when I forced the issue, it passed it to the Web browser - and I still saw the raw HTML. I'm not sure what the problem was. Another Web browser did translate the page. IOW, some recent programs will not be as generous as accepting problematic input as others, and some recent programs unfortunately still produce problematic output. -- Joe Yao ----------------------------------------------------------------------- This message is not an official statement of OSIS Center policies.
Don Welch, Merit Network wrote:
This issue is unique and does not represent a blanket policy. Any request to modify the archive is a serious issue that requires consultation with the Steering Committee and must be balanced against the loss of archive integrity.
Right here is the heart of the matter. This is a unique issue. Attempts to set policies to cover unique issues _will_ result in bad policies. Policies should be set to cover the general cases. Management prerogative (which should be bounded by policy) will best deal with the unique issues. -- Requiescas in pace o email Ex turpi causa non oritur actio http://members.cox.net/larrysheldon/
you sent html as opposed to an email message. as i do not use a web browser to read mail, i can not read your message. if you want me to read your email, send email. randy
Date: Wed, 20 Sep 2006 14:02:52 -0400 From: "Don Welch, Merit Network" <Don.Welch@merit.edu> To: nanog@nanog.org, 'Betty Burke' <bburke@merit.edu>, 'Mary Eileen McLaughlin' <mmclaughlin@merit.edu> Subject: Re: Removal of my name
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> <html> <head> <meta content="text/html;charset=ISO-8859-1" http-equiv="Content-Type"> </head> <body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000"> NANOG Community,<br> The issue of altering the NANOG Archive has come up and I wish to present Merit's position on the matter. <br> <br> The NANOG Acceptable Use Policy as it currently stands includes the following:<br> <br> 1. Discussion will focus on Internet operational and technical issues as described in the <a href="http://www.nanog.org/charter.html">charter</a> of NANOG. <br> 2. Postings of issues inconsistent with the charter are prohibited.<br> :<br> 4. Postings that include foul language, character assassination, and lack of respect for other participants are prohibited.<br> :<br> <br> The part of the post in dispute is not operational or technical and clearly shows a lack of respect for a participant. The subject of the post and not the poster requested that we remove his name from the post in the Archive. Merit has decided to replace the subject's name with "NAME REMOVED". Since this post was not allowed, we believe that we are correcting our mistake in a way that we think has the least impact on the integrity of the archive. We are not removing the post itself. The poster's name and the rest of the text are intact. The topic of the post is still clear even though the individual targeted is not. Operational or technical content was not modified.<br> <br> We have considered a number of things in making this decision including: the age of the post, the reason for the request and Merit's legal exposure. We let the Steering Committee know what we were doing. If you disagree, do not blame the Steering Committee although we consulted with the Steering Committee, it was my decision.<br> <br> This issue has been helpful in that it pointed out some shortcomings in our policies and notification mechanism. We are working with the Steering Committee to address those now. <br> <br> We are not removing a thoughtless post at the request of the poster and do not anticipate doing so in the future. <br> <br> This issue is unique and does not represent a blanket policy. Any request to modify the archive is a serious issue that requires consultation with the Steering Committee and must be balanced against the loss of archive integrity.<br> <br> See you at NANOG 38!<br> <br> Cheers,<br> Don <div class="moz-signature">-- <br> <title>Standard Signature</title> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; "> <meta content="MSHTML 6.00.2900.2912" name="GENERATOR"> <div align="left"><font face="Arial" size="1">Donald J. Welch, Ph.D.</font></div> <div align="left"><font face="Arial" size="1">President & CEO</font></div> <div align="left"><font face="Arial" size="1">Merit Network, Inc.</font></div> <div align="left"><font face="Arial" size="1"><a href="http://www.merit.edu">www.merit.edu</a></font></div> <div align="left"><font face="Arial" size="1">734-764-8450</font></div> <div align="left"><font face="Arial" size="1">1000 Oakbrook Drive</font></div> <div align="left"><font face="Arial" size="1">Ann Arbor, MI 48104</font></div> </div> </body> </html>
An e-mail message *can* in fact, be HTML, as HTML is a text payload like any other. It's not his (or the world's) fault your MUA is locked into 1982 mode and won't process the tags that are included in it. Cheers, D On Sep 20, 2006, at 2:20 PM, Randy Bush wrote:
you sent html as opposed to an email message. as i do not use a web browser to read mail, i can not read your message. if you want me to read your email, send email.
randy
Date: Wed, 20 Sep 2006 14:02:52 -0400 From: "Don Welch, Merit Network" <Don.Welch@merit.edu> To: nanog@nanog.org, 'Betty Burke' <bburke@merit.edu>, 'Mary Eileen McLaughlin' <mmclaughlin@merit.edu> Subject: Re: Removal of my name
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> <html> <head> <meta content="text/html;charset=ISO-8859-1" http-equiv="Content- Type"> </head> <body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000"> NANOG Community,<br> The issue of altering the NANOG Archive has come up and I wish to present Merit's position on the matter. <br> <br> The NANOG Acceptable Use Policy as it currently stands includes the following:<br> <br> 1. Discussion will focus on Internet operational and technical issues as described in the <a href="http://www.nanog.org/ charter.html">charter</a> of NANOG. <br> 2. Postings of issues inconsistent with the charter are prohibited.<br> :<br> 4. Postings that include foul language, character assassination, and lack of respect for other participants are prohibited.<br> :<br> <br> The part of the post in dispute is not operational or technical and clearly shows a lack of respect for a participant. The subject of the post and not the poster requested that we remove his name from the post in the Archive. Merit has decided to replace the subject's name with "NAME REMOVED". Since this post was not allowed, we believe that we are correcting our mistake in a way that we think has the least impact on the integrity of the archive. We are not removing the post itself. The poster's name and the rest of the text are intact. The topic of the post is still clear even though the individual targeted is not. Operational or technical content was not modified.<br> <br> We have considered a number of things in making this decision including: the age of the post, the reason for the request and Merit's legal exposure. We let the Steering Committee know what we were doing. If you disagree, do not blame the Steering Committee although we consulted with the Steering Committee, it was my decision.<br> <br> This issue has been helpful in that it pointed out some shortcomings in our policies and notification mechanism. We are working with the Steering Committee to address those now. <br> <br> We are not removing a thoughtless post at the request of the poster and do not anticipate doing so in the future. <br> <br> This issue is unique and does not represent a blanket policy. Any request to modify the archive is a serious issue that requires consultation with the Steering Committee and must be balanced against the loss of archive integrity.<br> <br> See you at NANOG 38!<br> <br> Cheers,<br> Don <div class="moz-signature">-- <br> <title>Standard Signature</title> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; "> <meta content="MSHTML 6.00.2900.2912" name="GENERATOR"> <div align="left"><font face="Arial" size="1">Donald J. Welch, Ph.D.</font></div> <div align="left"><font face="Arial" size="1">President & CEO</ font></div> <div align="left"><font face="Arial" size="1">Merit Network, Inc.</ font></div> <div align="left"><font face="Arial" size="1"><a href="http://www.merit.edu">www.merit.edu</a></font></div> <div align="left"><font face="Arial" size="1">734-764-8450</font></ div> <div align="left"><font face="Arial" size="1">1000 Oakbrook Drive</ font></div> <div align="left"><font face="Arial" size="1">Ann Arbor, MI 48104</ font></div> </div> </body> </html>
-- Derek J. Balling Manager of Systems Administration Vassar College 124 Raymond Ave Box 0406 - Computer Center 217 Poughkeepsie, NY 12604 W: (845) 437-7231 C: (845) 249-9731
An e-mail message *can* in fact, be HTML, as HTML is a text payload like any other.
It's not his (or the world's) fault your MUA is locked into 1982 mode and won't process the tags that are included in it.
Cheers, D
On Sep 20, 2006, at 2:20 PM, Randy Bush wrote:
you sent html as opposed to an email message. as i do not use a web browser to read mail, i can not read your message. if you want me to read your email, send email.
randy
More to the point, why punish the entire list by bickering about a minority inability to cope with the fact that some people are different? I'm sure if the message had been posted in Spanish, or hey, maybe even French, since English isn't the singular language of North America, this wouldn't be an issue. The world has more than eight bits. The community at large (read: me) does not care if someone has been left out because they *chose* to be or lacks the ability or wherewithal to adapt. In short: Technical snobbery is not operational. It took more effort to respond saying the mail couldn't be read than it probably took to sanitize it for reading. Being a member of the vocal minority isn't a point of pride, you're just louder than someone else. All ten out of the ten dinosaurs interviewed agree: Evolve, dodge the flaming ball of death, or stop showing up for dinner. The network will still be here long after your non-threaded news reader stops working. - billn
billn@billn.net wrote:
More to the point, why punish the entire list by bickering about a minority
Because this is NANOG, and NANOG is very careful to limit the traffic to stuff that is On Topic. -- Requiescas in pace o email Ex turpi causa non oritur actio http://members.cox.net/larrysheldon/
On 9/20/06, billn@billn.net <billn@billn.net> wrote:
More to the point, why punish the entire list by bickering about a minority inability to cope with the fact that some people are different?
It's because some MUAs are dain bramaged.
The world has more than eight bits.
Which is just one of the reasons that the MIME type "multipart/alternative" exists. Sane MUAs that wish to send HTML also send a text/plain alternative segment in the same MIME stream. The unfortunate part is that this classifies Thunderbird as not "sane", because its default configuration for dual-format output is "ask me" based on whether all addresses are in the address book with the HTML option enabled, rather than simply always sending multipart by default. -- -- Todd Vierling <tv@duh.org> <tv@pobox.com> <todd@vierling.name>
On Wed, 20 Sep 2006, Todd Vierling wrote:
On 9/20/06, billn@billn.net <billn@billn.net> wrote:
More to the point, why punish the entire list by bickering about a minority inability to cope with the fact that some people are different?
It's because some MUAs are dain bramaged.
The world has more than eight bits.
Which is just one of the reasons that the MIME type "multipart/alternative" exists. Sane MUAs that wish to send HTML also send a text/plain alternative segment in the same MIME stream.
The unfortunate part is that this classifies Thunderbird as not "sane", because its default configuration for dual-format output is "ask me" based on whether all addresses are in the address book with the HTML option enabled, rather than simply always sending multipart by default.
I can understand that. The point I'm trying to make, is why does Randy Bush *need* to make this a community problem, instead of talking directly to the user whose mail he cannot read? Why clog up nanog-l and nanog-futures over such a trivial issue that can be solved behind the scenes with something as simple as a polite query? Better yet, how about a polite email to the gang over at Thunderbird? They strike me as a pretty reasonable bunch that's open to community input. A couple of the responses I got to my initial salvo were, in summary, 'because it's NANOG.' As funny and appropriate as the answers may be, I hold up any recovering crack addict as an example. If you know you have a problem, and you can do something about it, please think of the children and put the pipe down. Bring back the exploding squirrel threads. Please. They may not have been directly operational, but at least they weren't a email flavored rehash of vi vs emacs. - billn
I can understand that. The point I'm trying to make, is why does Randy Bush *need* to make this a community problem, instead of talking
directly
to the user whose mail he cannot read?
perhaps in your haste to rant on you missed my message apologizing for doing so? randy
On Wed, 20 Sep 2006 16:23:46 EDT, Todd Vierling said:
Which is just one of the reasons that the MIME type "multipart/alternative" exists. Sane MUAs that wish to send HTML also send a text/plain alternative segment in the same MIME stream.
Vernon Schreyer made a very good point years ago that multipart/alternative is fundementally busticated, because there's two options: Option 1: The actual information content of both the text/plain and text/html is identical. Sending the html is therefor superflous. Option 2: There is added crucial semantic content in the HTML (links, table formatting, etc) that is not representable in the text/plain. At that point, sending the text/plain is *also* incorrect, as it allows the receiving MUA to punt and provide an incomplete and incorrect version of the information. Sending just the text/html and requiring the receiving MUA to do the downgrading with more precise knowledge of the exact non-representable brain damage is the correct behavior here (for instance, some MUAs are able to provide clickable links after filtering to text/plain, but unable to do proper table alignment). Similar ideas are included in RFC4141, where the receiving end provides info on what can/cant be displayed. In either case, sending both plain and html versions is boneheaded and wrong. :)
On Wed, Sep 20, 2006 at 05:04:53PM -0400, Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu wrote:
On Wed, 20 Sep 2006 16:23:46 EDT, Todd Vierling said:
Which is just one of the reasons that the MIME type "multipart/alternative" exists. Sane MUAs that wish to send HTML also send a text/plain alternative segment in the same MIME stream.
Vernon Schreyer made a very good point years ago that multipart/alternative is fundementally busticated, because there's two options: ...
I have been seeing a lot of a third option: the text part is either empty, contains filler, or says [essentially], "Your mail reader is broken, get one that reads HTML." These are all just wrong. And no longer limited to SPAM or malware, lest someone suggest that. ...
In either case, sending both plain and html versions is boneheaded and wrong. :)
A case may be made that at least it's an attempt. Some MUAs will at least flag where they have had to elide content. Remember that not everybody communicates/learns in the same way. Some need the pretty pictures. Some need to avoid them, and stick to text. -- Joe Yao ----------------------------------------------------------------------- This message is not an official statement of OSIS Center policies.
billn@billn.net wrote: Hrmm.... How many of you realize who Bill Manning is ? While you are at it, go flame Vinton Cerf... I am sure he will learn from you, too......
On Sep 20, 2006, at 4:35 PM, Richard Irving wrote:
billn@billn.net wrote:
Hrmm....
How many of you realize who Bill Manning is ?
While you are at it, go flame Vinton Cerf... I am sure he will learn from you, too......
I have known Bill for years, and respect him for a lot of what he has done. But if he is wrong, I have zero trouble calling him on it. Who you are doesn't change facts. That said, I admit I probably hesitate a bit longer before flaming Dr. Cerf. :) If you've ever met them both, you would understand why. -- TTFN, patrick
On Wed, Sep 20, 2006 at 07:05:04PM -0400, Patrick W. Gilmore wrote:
On Sep 20, 2006, at 4:35 PM, Richard Irving wrote:
billn@billn.net wrote:
Hrmm....
How many of you realize who Bill Manning is ?
yup.. i do. he's a wizzend, cynical, troll (may or may not be naked - see his previous post on not wanting to be forced to wear a teeshirt)
While you are at it, go flame Vinton Cerf... I am sure he will learn from you, too......
been there, done that. learned quite a bit.
I have known Bill for years, and respect him for a lot of what he has done. But if he is wrong, I have zero trouble calling him on it. Who you are doesn't change facts.
amen there.
That said, I admit I probably hesitate a bit longer before flaming Dr. Cerf. :) If you've ever met them both, you would understand why.
Vint does present a smaller target most days. :) --bill
-- TTFN, patrick
</signal><noise>
That said, I admit I probably hesitate a bit longer before flaming Dr. Cerf. :) If you've ever met them both, you would understand why.
I have, on more than one occasion. My old address was @onecall.net Perhaps you saw our cars in the Indy 500 ?
Vint does present a smaller target most days. :)
Well, there *is* the Atkins diet..... ;-) C-ya. </noise><signal?>
--bill
-- TTFN, patrick
On Wed, 20 Sep 2006 billn@billn.net wrote:
The world has more than eight bits. The community at large (read: me) does not care if someone has been left out because they *chose* to be or lacks the ability or wherewithal to adapt. In short: Technical snobbery is not operational. It took more effort to respond saying the mail couldn't be read than it probably took to sanitize it for reading. Being a member of the vocal minority isn't a point of pride, you're just louder than someone else.
I don't know why this is even an issue. I'm on a shell account, on a linux box, reading mail using Pine, and HTML mail is rendered just fine here, as text with some minimal amount of markup (extremely minimal). Pine runs on just about anything, has been around for years, is stable, and doesn't require plugins or mailcap entries to sanely render HTML to a text-only display. -- Steve Sobol, Professional Geek ** Java/VB/VC/PHP/Perl ** Linux/*BSD/Windows Apple Valley, California PGP:0xE3AE35ED It's all fun and games until someone starts a bonfire in the living room.
On Wed, Sep 20, 2006 at 02:59:47PM -0400, Derek J. Balling wrote:
An e-mail message *can* in fact, be HTML, as HTML is a text payload like any other.
Yes, and for those, one may use: /etc/mailcap:text/html; lynx %s; print=lynx -dump %s | lp But for some reason, that particular message failed to translate. -- Joe Yao ----------------------------------------------------------------------- This message is not an official statement of OSIS Center policies.
i suspect the html non-email issue has been discussed a bit in the past. but perhaps folk can not find the previous discussion because it has been removed from the archive :). so, since we need to relive it, perhaps we should do so over on nanog-futures. but there are a couple of more significant issues being discussed over there, those surrounding the community's desires for maintaining mailing list archive integrity. randy
On Wed, 20 Sep 2006, Randy Bush wrote:
but there are a couple of more significant issues being discussed over there, those surrounding the community's desires for maintaining mailing list archive integrity.
Personally I find it sad that at the prospect of a list archive being censored, the only discussion that could come up on this list was HTML versus plain text. Had the guy not re-sent the whole nonsense to the list itself I might have more sympathy for him. ========================================================== Chris Candreva -- chris@westnet.com -- (914) 967-7816 WestNet Internet Services of Westchester http://www.westnet.com/
On Wed, Sep 20, 2006 at 02:59:47PM -0400, Derek J. Balling wrote:
An e-mail message *can* in fact, be HTML, as HTML is a text payload like any other.
BTW, for mutt, you might try In .mailcap: text/html; lynx -dump -force_html %s; needsterminal; copiousoutput; In .muttrc: auto_view text/html application/x-X-sun-attachment In which case you can at least see the what's in the email. --dmm
participants (17)
-
Bill Woodcock -
billn＠billn.net -
billn＠pegasus.billn.net -
bmanning＠vacation.karoshi.com -
Christopher X. Candreva -
David Meyer -
Derek J. Balling -
Don Welch, Merit Network -
Joseph S D Yao -
Laurence F. Sheldon, Jr. -
Patrick W. Gilmore -
Randy Bush -
Richard Irving -
Steve Sobol -
Suresh Ramasubramanian -
Todd Vierling -
Valdis.Kletnieks＠vt.edu