Re: SER1 list archive

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On 1 Dec 2004, at 13:04, Diana Alan wrote:

> G'day Will
>
> Great start - because the posts are often days apart or may go back a 
> week
> or two it seems the threads get split with a comment "message missing" 
> then
> you find the thread with the missing message above or below.  Is there 
> a way
> for the users to re-merge the threads?  Or will that have to be done 
> by the
> manager/you?

The main source of that problem is a conversation that is begun by 
replying to another message and changing the title. It's a common 
shortcut with hard-to-remember list addresses, though that's not a very 
good defense here.

The archiving software tries to break threads that it should, and not 
any others. It will sometimes make mistakes, but generally a spread-out 
conversation should remain intact. The answer is probably just to omit 
the 'message missing' message when it occurs at the start of a thread, 
and be conservative about breaking threads.

> Some messages seem to be displayed as the message source - I guess 
> that's
> your comment about "displaying HTML".

yes. this kind of software is more commonly used on more 
programmer-oriented lists that disdain the sending of html-formatted 
mail. i need to teach it to extract the meaningful part. it's a small 
job.

> Do we need to archive all threads?  Or should we be selective about
> important information on Series One Land Rovers and not Aussie weather,
> cricket or personal discussions about trips etc?  What do others think?

it's very difficult to be appropriately selective without human 
intervention, and personally I think the list should be preserved in 
all its glory, but there are things we can do. messages with [OT] in 
the topic could be omitted, for example...

> I think your work is showing great promise and an asset to the list.

good. thank you.

will




>
> Thanks from Sydney Au
>
> Diana
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "William Ross" <will@xxxxxxx.xxx>
> To: <series1@xxxxxxxxx.xxx>
> Sent: Wednesday, December 01, 2004 11:04 PM
> Subject: SER1 list archive
>
>
> dear list,
>
> Having rashly promised to set up an archive and faq, I found that I
> didn't much like any of the standard packages for doing that. They're
> either drab or fussy or, most commonly, both. So I've rewritten one of
> them, which wasn't the quickest way to get the job done.
>
> There's still a little way to go - I'm in the process of bolting on a
> search engine from something else, and there are issues with displaying
> html mail cleanly - but the basic archiving and pagination seem to be
> working very nicely.
>
> See what you think, and please don't hesitate to send suggestions and
> comments through, however blunt or unfavourable.
>
> It's at:
>
> http://www.spanner.org/lists/s1/
>
> best
>
> will
>
>
> To change subscription see www.landrover.net/series1/mail
>
>
>
>
> To change subscription see www.landrover.net/series1/mail
>


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