> On Fri, 18 Jul 2008 17:56:59 -0400, John Dorsey <haskell@colquitt.org> >
wrote: > >>I already filter on something else. I proposed
adding the prefix for >>two reasons: (1) I file all my
haskell-related lists into the same >>box, and the prefix is handy for
quickly telling which one I'm reading. >>This can make the difference
between, say, suggesting unsafePerformIO >>(in the cafe) or a brief
explanation of IO (on this list). And (2) for >>conistency with
[Haskell] and [Haskell-cafe]. > > I see your point: You would
appreciate being able to use > "[Haskell-begin] unsafePerformIO" vs.
"[Haskell-cafe] unsafePerformIO" > to differentiate between a brief
explanation of IO on > Haskell-Beginners vs. suggesting unsafePerformIO on
Haskell-Cafe. > > That actually is a valid point, and could prove
useful at times. > > Apart from just consistency with "[Haskell]"
and "[Haskell-cafe]" in > the prefix for the subject lines of Haskell and
Haskell-Cafe, it seems > that a prefix would be useful in ensuring
consistency in having this > mailing list referred to as
"Haskell-Beginners," and not just > "Beginners," by new members.
Otherwise, the fact that the e-mail > address is beginners@haskell.org, and not >
haskell-beginners@haskell.org, could
create confusion. New members > would probably start saying
"Haskell" vs. "Haskell-Cafe" vs. > "Beginners," leading to further
inconsistencies in the proper names. > Eventually, most people would just
start calling this list "Beginners" > because the name is shorter, and the
name "Haskell-Beginners" would > become mostly forgotten. However,
if the prefix referred to the > proper name of the list in every message,
this confusion could be > minimized. > >>It's not
important to me. Sounds like the majority are for no prefix. >
> Nonetheless, you had a valid point, and many users had stated that
as > long as the prefix was short, the presence or absence of the
prefix > did not really matter to them. Ideally, my personal
preference would > be to be completely consistent with [Haskell] and
[Haskell-cafe], and > change the prefix to [Haskell-beginners], but it
seems that then many > readers would believe this prefix to be too long
and make the subject > line hard to read. > > For the sake of
argument, let's experiment: > > [Haskell-begin]
unsafePerformIO > [Haskell-beginners] unsafePerformIO > >
Now, let's try a longer example: > > [Haskell-begin] beginners
mailing list should be beginner's choice > [Haskell-beginners] beginners
mailing list should be beginner's choice > > Right now, in my
Yahoo! Mail Haskell-Cafe folder, a typical truncated > long subject-line
message reads as follows: > > [Haskell-cafe] ghc 6.8.3 build error
with __DISCARD__ linking problem, > please hel > > That's 81
characters. > > Right now, the longest example that I can find of a
subject line in > Haskell-Beginners is the following: > >
[Haskell-begin] Re: [Haskell-cafe] Trouble with non-exhaustive >
patterns > > That's 71 characters, using "[Haskell-begin]."
If we changed > "[Haskell-begin]" to "[Haskell-beginners]," that would add
4 > characters, increasing the length to 75. That's still below
81. > Here's a comparison: > > [Haskell-begin] Re:
[Haskell-cafe] Trouble with non-exhaustive > patterns >
[Haskell-beginners] Re: [Haskell-cafe] Trouble with non-exhaustive >
patterns > > Given that some mailing lists, such as plt-announce,
already get by > using prefixes of similar length (in their case,
"[PLT > announcement]," I think that in practice, after a few weeks,
most > readers would probably unconsciously just ignore the prefix and
read > the rest, and new readers would be able to read "[Haskell]"
vs. > "[Haskell-cafe]" vs. "[Haskell-beginners]" for consistency
(although > some users would probably complain at first). > >
Just for comparison, here are some examples of what is happening with >
the subject lines in plt-announce: > > [PLT announcement] PLT
Scheme v4.0 > [PLT announcement] PLT Scheme v4.0.2 > > Let's
compare what would happen with similar typical subject lines > with
"[Haskell-begin]" vs. "[Haskell-beginners]": > > [Haskell-begin]
Exercises for beginners and Natural Tansformations > [Haskell-beginners]
Exercises for beginners and Natural Tansformations > > What do you
think? Opinions, comment? You decide. > > -- Benjamin
L. Russell > >
_______________________________________________ > Beginners mailing
list > Beginners@haskell.org >
http://www.haskell.org/mailman/listinfo/beginners >