> While we're flying way off topic here, I'd love to ask exactly
> where I can find these "HTML standards" that everyone refers to.
Flying _WAY_ off topic, but I might as well put my $.02 in too. This is
entirely the problem with HTML -- there are no standards that everyone
adheres to. The phenomenal growth of Internet users in the past few
years hasn't given these standards a chance to catch up. The situation is
aggrevated even further by companies vying for the number one position,
each tring to introduce the feature to end all features before the
competition does. I am hoping (and perhaps naively so) that the
free distribution of Netscape source might allow for more responsible
development, but I'm not sure if the license will work that way.
> etc., etc. I can't believe that people are so willing to
> embrace a standard that is neither standard nor appropriate
> for the medium of email.
I agree that it is not appropriate, but only because of the lack
of standardization and "bastardized" HTML evident in some MUAs.
HTML could have an important role in email, but it must be
standardized by responsible programmers. W3C has been doing
a decent job in trying to bring together diverging HTML practices
evident in commercially developed software, and as mentioned
earlier, I hope that the introduction of the Internet programming
community into software development will make a difference.
> Anyone care to point me to an example of a "revolutionary" use
> of HTML in email? Something that makes the effort of wading
> through all the CRAP worthwhile?
I think the message that sparked this whole thread was asking for the
ability to link to subparts of a digest from the table of contents.
This would be a wonderful feature for those who have HTML-aware MUAs,
but I'm not sure if it has a place in Majordomo. I've been distressed by
what I perceive to be "creeping featurism" in Majordomo's development.
I'm not faulting the developers at all, and am amazed at the amount
of work and level of intensity that they put out. It just seems that
more and more people are becoming aware of majordomo, make a request
without thinking of the consequences, and pressure from an inexperienced
user base forces development into certain directions. "HTMLization"
of digests could be just as easily accomplished by creating a new list
called list-HTMLdigest and feeding all message to list-digest into it
via a filter that converts the messages.
The whole UNIX method is based on pipes and redirection, yet
for some reason everybody wants to cram everything into a
single package. The ability to use pipes is what made UNIX
great, mainly because of its flexibility. I would personally
like to see more programs developed for use WITH majordomo (like
WILMA) instead of as a patch to the main program.
> analogy is clear). Further, just because email readers a, b, or
> c are HTML-"ready" doesn't mean that it's a good thing. It just
> means that someone is trying to get more people to use their
> program - there's a big difference between selling/producing the
> most software and selling/producing the *best* software (see
> previous analogy).
I agree. Just for the record, I also have to say that I hate HTML
in my messages, not to mention MIME attachments. I've been a
proud elm user for about 6 years now (although I'm making a slow
and deliberate change to mutt), and reading any of those messages
is the biggest pain in the rear! But I also have to admit that
without those nifty features, most of my family members would have
never been inspired to learn about the Internet. They see it
through different eyes, but they enjoy it nonetheless. These visual
cues have helped make the Internet available to the right-brained
peope out there -- not the private playground of physicists.
Diatribe complete. :)
Chris
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Christopher Lindsey
System Engineer, National Center for Supercomputing Applications
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