Quote marks and Question marks

Davoud wrote:
> Using quotation marks and apostrophes rather than the inch sign " and
> the minute sign ' * hardly represents an affectation!

I wouldn't call it an affectation, but unless the mail or news
client tries to imitate Word's "smart quotes" it's certainly a
waste of time.

I think trying to imitate "curlies" in plain text with acute
and grave is an affectation, especially since with most fonts,
the result looks stupid.

( i.e., "this" vs ``this'' )

--
Wes Groleau
----
The man who reads nothing at all is better educated
than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.
-- Thomas Jefferson

Philo D wrote:
>> Using quotation marks and apostrophes rather than the inch sign " and
>> the minute sign ' * hardly represents an affectation!
>
> You mean " is not a quotation mark?
> http://www.csgnetwork.com/asciiset.html

When your e-mail is plain text like a civilized person's, it isn't.

--
Wes Groleau

He that complies against his will is of the same opinion still.
-- Samuel Butler, 1612-1680

tacit wrote:
> If you type an email message that contains characters which are not part
> of standard ASCII, such as curly quotes or accented characters, those
> characters are lost, .....

Not if your e-mail client specifies the encoding method, like it should.

Of course, nothing prevents a broken relay downstream from screwing
things up......


--
Wes Groleau
http://groleau.freeshell.org/teaching/

Wes Groleau wrote:
> But, when I use accented characters, ellipses, Chinese, etc. most
> readers see what I intended

Even when the text is pasted in from Word or a web page that
has curlies.

--
Wes Groleau
Can we afford to be relevant?
http://www.cetesol.org/stevick.html

Philo D wrote:
> > You mean " is not a quotation mark?
> > http://www.csgnetwork.com/asciiset.html

Wes Groleau wrote:
> When your e-mail is plain text like a civilized person's, it isn't.

Sorry, but civilized people sometimes write with fonts other than
Geneva or Verdana, and they may wish to see their text formatted
properly, so they may sometimes use html e-mail. I'm a civilized person
and I do that sometimes and I have yet to receive a complaint from a
respondant.

Davoud

--
usenet *at* davidillig dawt com

Davoud wrote:
> Sorry, but civilized people sometimes write with fonts other than
> Geneva or Verdana, and they may wish to see their text formatted
> properly, so they may sometimes use html e-mail. I'm a civilized person
> and I do that sometimes and I have yet to receive a complaint from a
> respondant.

I don't complain when I get HTML, but I don't like it.

I have NEVER received an e-mail in which anything important was lost
converting it to plain text (cutting the size anywhere from 50% to
1000% in the process).

Is there any practical difference between the following?

some words
<FONT size=24>some words</FONT>
some words (pretend those are in REALLY BIG LETTERS)

Yes, there is: the first has no unnecessary crap
to distract from the message.

I don't complain because there are more important battles
to fight. I suspect many people feel the same.
(And usually the sender has no clue what HTML is.)

--
Wes Groleau

You always have time for what you do first.

In article <>,
"G.T." <> wrote:

> >>Using quotation marks and apostrophes rather than the inch sign "
> >>and the minute sign ' * hardly represents an affectation!
> >
> >
> > The inch sign and minute sign are the quotation mark and
> > apostrophe, respectively.
>
> Huh?
>
> http://www.aeonix.com/comntypo.htm

Yeah, for typography, that's correct, but for newsgroups and plain text
email, that's not correct; those curly quotes are not part of plain
ASCII, which is what newsgroups and plain text email use.

--
Stop Mad Cowboy Disease: Impeach the son of a Bush.

Davoud wrote:
> > Sorry, but civilized people sometimes write with fonts other than
> > Geneva or Verdana, and they may wish to see their text formatted
> > properly, so they may sometimes use html e-mail. I'm a civilized person
> > and I do that sometimes and I have yet to receive a complaint from a
> > respondant.

Wes Groleau replied:
> I don't complain when I get HTML, but I don't like it.

OK, no HTML e-mail from me to you.

> I have NEVER received an e-mail in which anything important was lost
> converting it to plain text (cutting the size anywhere from 50% to
> 1000% in the process).

> Is there any practical difference between the following?
>
> some words
> <FONT size=24>some words</FONT>
> some words (pretend those are in REALLY BIG LETTERS)

Hmmm. Firstly, yes, to my elderly friend who has failing eyesight there
is a big difference. She can read the HTML, but not the plain text. I
take that to mean that something important would be lost if the e-mail
were sent in plain text. Othewise, on those /rare/ occasions when I
send HTML e-mail I don't use it in that way -- for the purpose of
writing in really big letters, that is.

Secondly, recipients don't see the underlying HTML, just a nicely
formatted letter.

Thirdly, I have never added 1000% to the size of an e-mail by HTML
encoding. 10%, maybe. So the e-mail takes 1.1sec to download on a
broadband connection vice 1 sec. 11 sec vice 10 sec on dialup.

> I don't complain because there are more important battles
> to fight. I suspect many people feel the same.

I certainly hope so. I find that trivial rules with "never" in them
often don't work well for me; more important ones such as "Never stand
in the path of a speeding train" seem to make more of an impression on
me.

> (And usually the sender has no clue what HTML is.)

Can't comment on that, since it doesn't apply to me. Judging from the
pleasing appearance of the few HTML e-mails that I receive, my
respondants seem to have some notion of what they are doing. I'm quite
certain that my elderly friend couldn't write HTML by hand to save her
life, yet she manages to use it (from time to time) in an intelligent
way.

It comes down to the same old lesson: please do it your way, and please
don't condemn me for doing it my way.

Davoud

--
usenet *at* davidillig dawt com

Davoud wrote:
> > > Using quotation marks and apostrophes rather than the inch sign " and
> > > the minute sign ' * hardly represents an affectation!

Wes Groleau:
> > I wouldn't call it an affectation, but unless the mail or news
> > client tries to imitate Word's "smart quotes" it's certainly a
> > waste of time.

> > I think trying to imitate "curlies" in plain text with acute
> > and grave is an affectation, especially since with most fonts,
> > the result looks stupid.
> >
> > ( i.e., "this" vs ``this'' )

G.T.:
> Absolutely agree. That looks absurd.

But I've never done that, have I? In fact, I haven't see that for
years, and I get around the 'net a bit.

I don't understand why it is necessary to refer to quotation marks as
curlies. Firstly, they do not "curl" in all type faces; sometimes they
are merely slanted. Secondly, referring to these signs as quotation
marks suffices to differentiate them from the symbol ", which we all
use /in/ /place/ /of/ a quotation mark, but which /is/ /not/ a
quotation mark.

Davoud

--
usenet *at* davidillig dawt com

In article <280620061500125608%dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderstone. ca>,
Dave Balderstone <dave@N_O_T_T_H_I_Sbalderstone.ca> wrote:

> > ASCII stupid question, get a stupid ANSI.
>
> Good one! Consider it stolen!

Ditto.

--
Stop Mad Cowboy Disease: Impeach the son of a Bush.