DJ Bernstein's str library

[Mark McIntyre]

the conventions of Usenet, rather than just telling one person who'd
insulted me and posted a non-sequitor
where to get off.

You need to remember that usenet is not a point-to-point personal
messaging system. You post a rude message, it gets read by everyone.

 

[Poldie]

You then snipped it back to:

|> Provide context, there is no guarantee that everyone who
|> sees your post
|
|etc etc
|
|Yawn. Guess what - I don't care.

Which reads as you saying that you don't care about whether other people
know what you are respond to.

It's ambiguous as to how many people I don't care about - there isn't
enough information to determine this with any degree of accuracy.

If you object to the way I phased it or think I insulted you then you
should say that rather than saying that you don't care about whether
people can tell when you are replying to.

People respond to (what they perceive as) abuse directed towards them
in different ways. Clearly if I'd known that I would start a chain of
events that resulted in 58 (and counting) posts, many of which are far
more insulting than your or my post and resulted in several people
being killfiled I would have phrased it slightly differently - not even
the most deranged of trolls could have dreamed of such a result from 6
little words! (I'm still one of only four people who have actually
addressed the post which started this thread, which amuses me.)

It is not `campaign for grumpiness where grumpiness is due` it is an
attempt to educate people in how to make their posts legible.

Don't worry - perhaps you weren't reading this group back then.

I'm not so easily offended.

Sweet. Sadly however it seems that several other people have become
offended on your behalf.

 

[Mark McIntyre]

Way to not give me a chance to answer your accusations.

You had your chances earlier on.

You still haven't explained why your name, which is for all intents
and purposes part of your sig, is above the line.

He has, but you're evidently unable to understand.

And by the way, there's no law that says your name has to be in your
sig. Many people don't do it that way.

The only mark which is reasonably widely-understood to signify an
exact quote on usenet is >, not ".

Thats absolutely incorrect - a quoted section of post might be marked
with chevrons, a quotation in a post would follow the normal
conventions.

Here you actually *show* a counterexample to your remark above!
Astonishing !

Or are you going to tell me that



doesn't mean "bullshit"?

And since when was bullshit profanity these days? Get with the
program!

 

[Default User]

You had your chances earlier on.

That's exactly right, he had his chance to retract that outrageous
statement, instead he pretends that it doesn't mean what he said.

He has, but you're evidently unable to understand.

And by the way, there's no law that says your name has to be in your
sig. Many people don't do it that way.

It doesn't matter, as I said this is all a smoke screen to deflect away
from his own behavior.

And since when was bullshit profanity these days? Get with the
program!

It's a sad day when using a euphemism to try and avoid unnecessarily
inflaming the discussion is considered a bad thing. Again, just another
way for Jordan to try and steer the discussion away from HIS actions.

Nothing I see in what you've quoted makes me regret my decision to
place him in the ol' bozo bin.



Brian

 

[Richard Heathfield]

Default User said:

Nothing I see in what you've quoted makes me regret my decision to
place him in the ol' bozo bin.

On the other hand, please consider the following facts:

1) Jordan has already shown that he knows a fair bit about C, and is thus a
potentially valuable addition to the group;
2) He is very new to comp.lang.c, and it is not uncommon for newcomers to
the group to have one or two teething problems as they acclimatise to our
existing sub-culture;
3) We are rapidly approaching the season of goodwill (in some countries,
probably including yours).

For all these reasons, I suggest that you re-consider your decision. I
happen to think Jordan is in the wrong in this case, but I don't agree that
his "crime" is beyond redemption, and I suggest that an embarrassed "sorry"
on his part and a bit of slack-cutting on yours will go a long way towards
encouraging comp.lang.c to become a happier, bouncier, tiggerier group.

 

[Default User]

Richard Heathfield wrote:

For all these reasons, I suggest that you re-consider your decision.
I happen to think Jordan is in the wrong in this case, but I don't
agree that his "crime" is beyond redemption, and I suggest that an
embarrassed "sorry" on his part and a bit of slack-cutting on yours
will go a long way towards encouraging comp.lang.c to become a
happier, bouncier, tiggerier group.

If he apologizes, then I'm sure someone will be happy to reply with
that quoted. Should that happen, I'd be more than willing to accept
that and move on.

We shall see.




Brian

 

[Skarmander]

Richard Heathfield wrote:

[..] it is not uncommon for newcomers to the group to have one or two
teething problems as they acclimatise to our existing sub-culture;

Which is one of inhospitability and impatience, weakly justifying this
with its impeccable collective expertise, expressed as an almost
obsessive equation of ego with the ability to embody an objective authority.

Well, as I see it. It's also a good place for getting questions on C
answered.

S.

 

[Dik T. Winter]

> Way to not give me a chance to answer your accusations. I saw at
> least one message without it attached, and its content did happen to
> be related to the present discussion [and didn't seem like the type
> of thing someone would have for their general-use .sig], so i guess
> i jumped to a conclusion. That is the ONLY thing i did. Calling me a
> liar and *plonk*ing without offering me so much as a chance to
> answer that accusation was uncalled for.

Then why did you put your comment:

> Repeat after me: hyphen hyphen space newline.
>
> Normally I wouldn't bother, but you know what they say about casting
> the first stone and all that.

in direct follow-up to an article that *did* have the sig? See:
<to which your respone was
directed. Or do I not understand you? As long as I have seen Default
User use this sig he in general uses it mainly in cases where he points
out to somebody that his quoting through googlegroups is inadequate.

 

[Richard Heathfield]

Skarmander said:

Richard Heathfield wrote:

[..] it is not uncommon for newcomers to the group to have one or two
teething problems as they acclimatise to our existing sub-culture;

Which is one of inhospitability and impatience,

Not everyone here is inhospitable. Not everyone here is impatient. I agree,
however, that these characteristics are unnecessarily and regrettably
prevalent. On the other hand, it's never too late to change.

 

[Richard Heathfield]

Default User said:

Richard Heathfield wrote:




If he apologizes, then I'm sure someone will be happy to reply with
that quoted. Should that happen, I'd be more than willing to accept
that and move on.

I was hoping you'd be a little less hard-hearted than that and be the first
to hold out an olive branch. Ah well - I guess it's a bit early for
Christmas.

 

[Jordan Abel]

Jordan, you started off making some quite useful postings here.
However you're rapidly becoming persona non grata due to your
attitude. Perhaps you might want to reconsider the wisdom of attacking
the regulars and gurus in a group?

Public notice of a "*plonk*ing" is at best entirely unnecessary and
at worse an attempt to hurt the 'victim' more through groupthink.

He has one. Your newsreader is broken.

It's in the middle of his sig, rather than preceding it, and the
section below it is [by his admission] sometimes not present.

 

[Jordan Abel]

First you claim he has no sig at all. Then you complain that he
changed it.
Like many people here, Brian changes his .sig from time to time.
Since when was that a crime?

I've explained the [spurious] reasoning behind my mistake and
apologized. I still don't appreciate being called a liar and plonked
when it was an honest mistake.

I wouldn't have brought it up in the first place if not for the fact
that the thread was already about what I perceived to be a nitpicky
detail of usenet etiquette.

Also, my statement "It's more annoying to read about people
complaining about it", while I did not mean it in that sense, seems
almost prescient in the face of the fact that that one complaint
ballooned into a flamewar of many dozens of posts which has shoved
aside the original question and IIRC infringed on at least one other
thread besides the original.

 

[Jordan Abel]

For all these reasons, I suggest that you re-consider your
decision. I happen to think Jordan is in the wrong in this case,
but I don't agree that his "crime" is beyond redemption, and I
suggest that an embarrassed "sorry" on his part

One more time, in light of the fact that others may not perceive my
previous attempts as being sincere [To be completely honest, if i
were in a bad mood i wouldn't]:

I screwed up and i'm sorry.

 

[Netocrat]

If he apologizes, then I'm sure someone will be happy to reply with
that quoted. Should that happen, I'd be more than willing to accept
that and move on.

On Sat, 29 Oct 2005 09:21:39 +0000, with Message-ID

 

[Richard Heathfield]

Jordan Abel said:

For all these reasons, I suggest that you re-consider your
decision. I happen to think Jordan is in the wrong in this case,
but I don't agree that his "crime" is beyond redemption, and I
suggest that an embarrassed "sorry" on his part

One more time, in light of the fact that others may not perceive my
previous attempts as being sincere [To be completely honest, if i
were in a bad mood i wouldn't]:

I screwed up and i'm sorry.

Brian - that seems pretty unequivocal to me. How about some grace here?

 

[Joe Estock]

What are you on about? He didn't tell _you_ to "**** off" - and,
yes, it's annoying, but it's not like his post didn't have a
References header. It's more annoying to read half a dozen posts
complaining about it than to hit alt-p and fetch the original post
in the first place. He might also have been more inclined to listen
to a friendly "Here's how to get google to let you quote context -
you know, for future reference" then what was basically "go to hell,
you're an asshole for not quoting and oh you wanna know how? search
the goddamn web yourself - and by the way the ideas in your post
also suck". If anyone was told "**** off" by anyone first, it was
him.

Perhaps, however it is not our fault that he is obviously a mornon who
knows nothing about usenet etiquette. Alt-p is a great idea, I wonder
why none of us thought of that before - oh wait, some clients DO NOT
SUPPORT THAT furthermore, even in the clients that do support it some
usenet providers do not keep messages for that long. In fact, some only
keep the last 2 or 3 messages in a thread. Big surprise, eh?

This is not the newsgroup to grow some balls in so do us all a favor and
learn the proper netiquette around here.

-Joe

 

[Mike Wahler]

Public notice of a "*plonk*ing" is at best entirely unnecessary and
at worse an attempt to hurt the 'victim' more through groupthink.


It's in the middle of his sig,

Any text preceding the "-- \n" delimiter is *not*
part of a sig, so no, it's *not* "in the middle"
of his sig. *He* gets to decide what goes in his
sig, not you.

rather than preceding it, and the
section below it is [by his admission] sometimes not present.

It's also *his* decision, not yours, whether to always
use the same sig, or use one at all.

Get a clue.

-Mike

 

[Jordan Abel]

Any text preceding the "-- \n" delimiter is *not* part of a sig,
so no, it's *not* "in the middle" of his sig. *He* gets to decide
what goes in his sig, not you.

You know what? I've dropped it. I don't care. I never really cared,
and I explained at the time my reason why, *despite* not caring, I
pointed it out.

However, your claim is basically defining the issue out of
existence, along with ALL instances of people failing to include the
sig-dash - why have the rule - or indeed any rules, at all, if we're
going to define all rulebreaking cases out of existence? One could
just as well say that posts that don't quote text aren't really in
reply, and therefore aren't required to quote text.

-Mike

That is a sig.

 

[Mike Wahler]

You know what? I've dropped it. I don't care. I never really cared,
and I explained at the time my reason why, *despite* not caring, I
pointed it out.

However, your claim is basically defining the issue out of
existence, along with ALL instances of people failing to include the
sig-dash - why have the rule - or indeed any rules, at all, if we're
going to define all rulebreaking cases out of existence? One could
just as well say that posts that don't quote text aren't really in
reply, and therefore aren't required to quote text.

That is a sig.

Not it is not, using the Usenet definition of 'sig'. But
feel free to perpetuate your ignorance.

The text below (beginning with "-- ") does comprise a 'sig', regardless of
the
content or meaning of that text.

-Mike

 

[Jordan Abel]

Not it is not, using the Usenet definition of 'sig'. But
feel free to perpetuate your ignorance.

I would like to see a cite for your "Usenet definition" - Yours is
the extraordinary claim since it invalidates an entire section of
commonly-observed etiquette rules, but I'll cite evidence for my
case anyway:

http://catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/S/sig-block.html does not mention
the dash

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signature_block lists the dash as a
requirement, not a prerequisite. [i.e. (paraphrase) "Sig blocks must
be delimited from the message with the dash" NOT "a sig block is any
text preceded by the dash"]

It is arguable that if either yours or his are not automatically
inserted they do not fit the letter of the definition, but let's
keep in mind the _spirit_ i.e. the actual reason for requiring the
dash - it's so that content which is not part of the message and not
generally considered to be something someone would reply to will be
automatically removed from the quoted text when hitting reply.

I'm also unconvinced by his rationale for having his name above the
sig line.